Metal Slug: Mercenaries
by Lt Colonel Summers
Summary: Trouble is brewing once again, originating from the old enemies of the Regular Army. But this time, Regular Army Command have new tricks up their sleeves: New batches of mercenaries with statistics rivaling the original commandos. However, things soon goes on a serial escalation for both the original commandos and the Mercenaries...
1. Prologue

**Forewords**

Hey, guys!

Some of you might recognize me from the Fanfiction archives for _Touhou Project_, as the guy who writes the _Fantasy Blitzkrieg _series.

If not, well...

Let me introduce myself then. The name's Lieutenant Colonel Summers, but you can call me LT. I'm a geek when it comes to military stuffs, and the _Metal Slug Series _created by SNK Playmore has been one of my favorite games. SNK submitted their last entry of the games in the form of _Metal Slug XX_, and stopped after that. I've thought they have abandoned the franchise until they released _Metal Slug Defense_ for mobile devices in the year 2014. Glad to know that they haven't forgotten the series...

For those of you new to _Metal Slug_, its a series of side-scrolling platformer plus shoot'em up made by the same team who made the _King Of Fighters_ series. The games are about a government-controlled military force known as the Regular Army, fighting a band of rogue Nazi-like militants known as the Rebelllion - or Rebel Army. The game is named after the Super Vehicle-001, also known as the Metal Slug, a tank capable of feats not seen in real-life army vehicles.

According to informations given by SNK, the Rebels started life when their leader, Donald Morden blames the Regular Army for a botched anti-terrorist operation that took the life of his son. The former Regular general defects from them and is never heard of again. A year later, Morden resurfaced, running an entire regime known as the Rebel Army, and plans to cleanse world governments of political corruption by taking over the world.

The Regular Army spent the entire series fighting the Rebels, with an exception for several games where the plot is hijacked by the Martians in _Metal Slug 2/X _and_ 3_, the Amadeus Syndicate in _4_, the Venusians in _6_ (whom managed to hijack the Martians as well) and Oguma Industries in the Japan-only _Metal Slug 3D_. The only game where the Rebels does not have any appearance at all is _Metal Slug 5_, where the plot revolves around the much more dangerous Ptolemaic Army.

As for the actual plotlines of each game, you should check out the Metal Slug Wiki or look up the series on Wikipedia.

This is my first _Metal Slug_ fanfic. _Metal Slug_ and all related characters and entities belong to SNK Playmore. That's it then, hope you enjoy!

* * *

**Prologue**

Time: Year 2040 AD. Exact time unknown.

Location: Undisclosed.

A man in his late fifties stood in the middle of a pitch-black hallway, with only the cigar in his mouth as a source of light.

The man took a puff of the cigar, and just stood there, as though waiting for someone.

Just then, he sensed a presence approaching him in the pitch-black hallway.

"How is everything going, Mr President?" The presence asked the man with a stern voice.

The man took the cigar off his mouth, and breathed out a puff of smoke. The presence is not fazed one bit by this act. "Exactly as planned by you." The man, identified as a President of some sort, answered, not so sternly. "Just one more year, and you will have what you wanted..."

"Do you remember what I wanted, Mr President?" The presence asked, hidden by the shadows well enough that he might as well be one with the darkness.

"Of course, it's the perfect template that you wanted." The President answered. He decided he had enough of his cigar, and extinguished it before putting it back in his pocket.

"Then I will see you again in an unspecified future." The presence said. The sound of footsteps growing softer and softer indicates that he is leaving the pitch-black hallway. "Remember: do whatever it takes to perfect the perfect templates..."

...

Time: 29th of December, 2040.

Location: Somewhere above the Pacific.

The peaceful sunny skies of the Pacific Ocean was disturbed by a massive object falling from the stratosphere at a velocity matching a spacecraft in orbital reentry. The object is, however, not suffering any effects at all despite its surface scraping the Earth's atmosphere fast enough to light it ablaze.

Closer inspection reveals that the object is in fact, a creature of gargantuan size, with a pair of slender, three-fingered arms attached to an alien head that has an exposed brain. Held between its slender fingers are two Metal Slugs.

There were also a group of people fighting the huge creature. Some standing on its demonic face, some taking potshots at its exposed brain in Mini-UFOs.

"It's about time we sent these goddamned Martians to extinction!" Cursed a blond-haired man in the red vest, unloading his Heavy Machine Gun into the huge creatures brain.

The other humans were too busy attacking the creature to respond. While most of them were shooting at it with their guns, one man was literally punching its exposed brain with impossibly fast punches.

The huge creature had the disadvantage of too few variety of attacks, one of which is a mind blast takes a while to charge up. The disadvantage prove to be its demise when its brain exploded into a mess of grey matter after being attacked continuously. The creature roared in pain and stopped all movements, as the humans standing on its face quickly boarded the tanks it held before it released them.

The Metal Slugs and Mini-UFOs entered a state of free fall while their occupants watched the abomination of a Martian plunge to its watery grave under the Pacific Ocean into the Challenger's Deep undersea ravine. Seconds later, the Metal Slugs landed on the ocean surface alongside the human-occupied Mini-UFOs. Both Metal Slugs deployed their floaters and slowly floated toward the surface, while the Mini-UFOs were abandoned by their human occupants as they swam towards the surface.

The Metal Slugs broke the surface with a loud splash. The rest of the team regrouped on the floating tanks, tired of all the actions and adventures of the past few days.

"Well, looks like Rootmars is sleeping with the fishes, again."

"Sure hoped this is the last alien race that mankind has ever fought..."

"Yeah, if there are other alien races out there, they better leave us to our own business!"

"So much for aliens, but we still have General Morden and the Rebel Army to deal with..."

"Not to mention the possibility of the Amadeus Syndicate and the Ptolemaic Army resurfacing."

As the human commandos chatted with each other, they suddenly find themselves being disturbed by the arrival of a blue Chinook transport helicopter.

"Perengine Falcons, SPARROWS, and Ikari Mercenaries, good job on this mission! You have once again saved the Earth from destruction!" The pilot of the helicopter greeted the commandos.

"Nah, that's every year of our lives. This one's nothing..." Said the blond-haired commando with the red vest.

"Let's do a head count to make sure everyone's here." The helicopter pilot said. "First off: Marco Rossi."

"Here."

"Tarma Roving."

"Present."

"Eri Kasamoto."

"Also present..."

"Fiolina Germi."

"Over here~!"

"Nadia Cassel."

"Here!"

"Trevor Spacey."

Getting no response, the pilot looked at the commandos through the helicopter windshield. Trevor Spacey seems to be busy... laughing himself off in a boastful manner.

"I'll take that as a yes. Next one: Clark Still."

"Right here."

"Ralf Jones."

Ralf Jones announced his presence by punching the Metal Slug hard enough to dislodge one of its Vulcan guns.

"Okay, that's coming out of your wallet..." The pilot deadpanned. "Last one: Leona."

"..." Leona, the blue-haired Ikari Mercenary made no response.

"Ah, forget it..." The pilot told himself. "Ready to go home?"

**FINAL MISSION COMPLETE!**

* * *

**Afterwords**

That's it for the prologue, then. Ending with the permanent defeat of the Martians and Rootmars. That battle is basically a recreation from _Metal Slug 3_, except that Trevor and Nadia from _4_, Clark and Ralf from _6_, and Leona from _XX_ are also in it. I might just include Walter and Tyra from _Advance_, and Gimlet and Red Eye from _2nd Mission._

That's it then. Look forward to the next chapter of this fanfic!

If you recognize me from that other Fanfiction archive, you will know that I'm prone to making references to other medias.

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	2. Chapter 1: Old Foes, New Countermeasures

**Foreword**

An empty Forewords section to start off a new series.

How lame...

Wish I get this problem fixed from my mind...

* * *

**Chapter 1: Old Foes, New Countermeasures**

Time: 0800 Hour; 30th of December, 2040.

Location: Boot Camp, Regular Army Command; Virginia, United States.

A Regular Soldier climbed up a watchtower, scanned the vicinity with a binocular, and then grabbed a nearby trumpet which he blows with. The notes of the trumpet are annoying for anyone listening to it, more so for those who were woken up from their sleep by it.

"Hey, you!" Yelled another soldier from the sole window of a nearby bunker. "SHUT UP!" Shouting, he aimed and fired a Super Grenade at the watchtower where the offending sound is coming from.

The Regular Soldier with the trumpet was spooked by this, and jumped off the watchtower just before the Super Grenade struck and blew it up in a spectacular fireball.

The soldier with the Super Grenade then laid back on his bunk bed, attempting to catch some more Z.

...

Location: Mess Hall, Regular Army Command.

"What a lame way to celebrate New Years Eve..." complained Marco Rossi, sitting next to a table, slowly stirring the bowl of cereal in front of him. "It's only yesterday that we ended the Martians for good, but Morden and his goons got away again!"

Tarma Roving leaned against the door. "But at least that's one enemy we won't be seeing ever again..." Said the Japanese commando.

However, Tarma didn't expect anyone to be able to open the door when he is leaning against it. He got squashed against the wall as a result. A familiar face came from the other side of the door.

"Besides, you do know that today isn't New Years Eve, tomorrow is..." Eri Kasamoto told Marco with a deadpan tone.

"How can you be so oblivious to what day it is, Marco?" Fiolina Germi barged in and complained.

Poor Tarma is still stuck behind that door, unable to move one bit. "Guys? Need some help here..."

"We better hurry..." Eri pointed a thumb behind her. "HQ called us all for emergency briefing..."

...

Location: Visitor Waiting Hall, Regular Army Command.

"And this year's Best K-Pop Band Award goes to..." Said the TV announcer from a TV in the Visitor Waiting Hall.

"Super Junior! Yeah!" Trevor Spacey announced on his own out of excitement.

Unfortunately, the true answer was something completely different than what the white-haired South Korean gave.

"Girls' Generation!" The TV announcer said.

"WHAT THE HECK?!" Trevor practically spat his heart out in surprise. "NOOOOOOO!" He screamed in massive disappointment, and head-butted the TV so hard that the screen shattered. Trevor didn't try to get up, as he continued crying so much that his tears are pouring out of his eyes like waterfalls.

"Not so suh-weet, _non_?" Nadia Cassel stood behind the South Korean while face-palming. "You East Asians kept forgetting that the biggest threat to you all is North Korea..."

"Ah leas ther nodin compar too deh Ish..." Trevor responded while continued crying in front of the broken TV. But he stopped and got up just for the last words in that sentence. "...Islamic State..."

"You better act like a grown-up, because we're being called for an emergency briefing!"

...

Location: Ikari Mercenaries' Private Training Hall, Regular Army Command.

Ralf Jones was focused on attacking a punching bag with his signature Vulcan Punch, followed by the Galactic Phantom. However, he punched the punching bag so hard that it was propelled with enough velocity to smash through a wall and collapse it. Ralf did not seem to notice, as he did the victory pose he was known for in the _King Of Fighters_ Tournaments.

"Uh, that's coming out of your wallet again, friend..." Clark Still reminded him, as he did his Super Argentine Backbreaker on another punching bag that has the photo of Rugal Bergenstein taped to it. The punching bag went toward the ceiling, but stopped short of hitting a ceiling fan before coming back down.

Just then, the PA went live. "Attention, Ikari Mercenaries, please report to the Command Center for immediate emergency briefing."

Both Ralf and Clark turned toward the speaker where the PA announcement came from.

"I guess the wall can wait, Morden's up to something again..." Clark said.

"What about Leona?" Ralf wondered, since the woman in question is absent from the Training Hall.

"Said she's got a hunch this morning that we're all going to be called in for another mission, so she went to the Command Center first." Clark replied. "Let's go. Rugal can also wait..."

...

Five minutes later...

Location: Command Center, Regular Army Command.

"As you can see, Ladies and gentlemen..." The Regular Commandos were not surprised with suddenly meeting a new Commanding Officer, since the previous one retired after the previous mission. What surprised them that the new CO isn't a human, its an AI. "Satellite imagery got hold of a new Rebel facility being built in San Francisco, with what used to be the Alcatraz Prison serving as the entrance. We don't know what Morden and his goons are up to, but it is imperative that whatever it is down there be captured or destroyed"

"Typical for the Rebels..." Marco gave a simple comment.

"However, this mission, and perhaps those to follow, are no slouch on the couch. We've got good news and bad news for you..." The AI CO continued its briefing. "Good news are - Intelligence is able to confirm, with a hundred percent positivity that Donald Morden is definitely in that facility. The facility is also one-way-in one-way-out. Geographical scans indicates the complete lack of secret tunnels, which means that Morden won't be able to escape when cornered."

"Finally, that bastard has no way to escape! Catching him should be no problem. "Tarma said. "After we deal with whatever he's building down there, of course."

"But that's when the bad news come in..." The AI CO interrupted with no tone of annoyance in its recorded speech. "Aside from the aforementioned one-way-in one-way-out making your own returning outside difficult, Intelligence is also positive that the Rebels have pledged their allegiance with the Amadeus Syndicate _and_ the Ptolemaic Army. The leaders of those two factions will want _your_ heads after your first encounter with either."

"Why do I get the feeling that this mission is entirely luck-based?" Eri had her suspicion with the mission.

"To make matters worse, both Morden and Amadeus have specifically dared you all, and I mean _you all_ to come and try to fight them." The AI CO continued, again with no tone of worriedness in its speech. "It's like they had this cooperative project just to deal with you guys..."

Upon hearing the last part, the whole group became tense. Fio tightened her grip on her teddy bear, whereas Trevor and Nadia bumped into each other while running around in panic. The Ikari Mercenaries, Ralf, Clark and Leona remained calm about the situation.

"I don't care what surprises he has for us!" Ralf boasted as he cracked his fists.

"We shall kick his ass!" Clark joined in with the boasting, as he kicked a nearby shelf to demonstrate his fearlessness. In doing so, the mercenary in blue had spilled the contents of that shelf, one of which is a (thankfully fake) Iron Lizard missile car.

Leona, the typical deadpan she is, let out a sigh in embarrassment of her teammates.

"But the Regular Army will respond to challenges with more than the challenger bargained for!" The AI CO announced. "Which is why you will be accompanied by the elites of the Regular Army."

"The elites?" Trevor and Nadia got up from bumping into each other, and asked in unison.

"Yes. The elite commandos are themselves Mercenaries, just like the Ikari Mercenaires, but better than all of you combined even while they have a smaller group."

Both Clark and Ralf are disappointed when they heard of a group of Mercenaries that are better than themselves.

Leona seems to look forward to meeting them. "What do they call themselves?"

"These elite Mercenaries, who will be accompanying you in bringing the Rebel-Amadeus-Ptolemaic Joint Forces down, are called..." The AI CO, reaching the end of its pre-programmed speech, spat out four last words. "...The Red Eagles Squad..."

...

Undisclosed Location...

"Jenny dear, you got the message from Regular Army Command?"

"Yes, Jason dear. They want the four of us to help the originals in fighting the Rebels..."

"Plus the Amadeus Syndicate and the Ptolemaic Army, all three at once! Right, Mina?"

"Just because I'm a Japanese doesn't mean I'm an otaku. So let's go, Ash~!"

* * *

**Afterwords**

Surprised? The Rebel Army, Amadeus Syndicate and Ptolemaic Army teamed up _just to deal with the original commandos!_

Okay, maybe not surprising to most of you, but you can just see how desperate those three factions were, after getting their arrogant ass kicked multiple times with a dose of **Heavy Masheen Gun!** or **Rocket Lawnchair!**.

Anyways, the original commandos are not the protagonists this time around, the Red Eagles are.

Do note that while the Red Eagles are Original Characters, they are not my creations. Credit goes to MadSoldiersProduction who, while doesn't have an account on this website, used the Red Eagles in a series of sprite-based Web Comics called _Metal Slug History X_ in his own website. Thanks, MadSoldier!

Shout-out index:

"SHUT UP!" ***Super Grenade!*** - A random Regular Soldier getting almost blown up trying to wake up everyone came from MegaAuthor's lists of Running Gags in his stories. Thanks, mate!

"NOOOO!" - Trevor getting disappointed at Super Junior not getting any awards came from _The Robot Conspiracy_ by AR Studios. Thank, mate!

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	3. Chapter 2: The Red Eagles Squad

**Forewords**

From this chapter on, each chapter will contain the events of an entire level from the starting point to the main boss.

There will be mini-bosses in each and every mission...

...And the bosses of the original games will be powered up.

* * *

**Chapter 2: The Red Eagles Squad**

Time: 0930 Hour; 30th of December, 2040.

Location: San Francisco, United States.

The Regular Commandos arrived in the city of San Francisco in a modified Chinook transport helicopter, which was often nicknamed "Regular Hi-Do" due to its uncanny resemblance to Donald Morden's personal helicopter.

The Regular Commandos looked down on the streets of San Francisco, which was crawling with Rebel Soldiers and their vehicles.

"No signs of the Amadeus Syndicate, or the Ptolemaic Army." Marco said, while loading a full magazine into his handgun.

"But then again, they started this joint campaign just to deal with us..." Tarma reminded his partner.

The Regular Chinook is suddenly disturbed by turbulence, indicating that another aircraft is flying close to it.

The Peregrine Falcons took a look at the newly arrived aircraft. They knew what it was, for they have seen it before.

"That's... the Tetsuyuki!" Eri acknowledged.

"But the report indicates that it was destroyed in the First Morden War!" Fio added to the exclamation.

Without warnings, the Tetsuyuki deployed its starboard guns, and opened fire on the Regular Commandos. The energy shells fired by the Rebel gunship mostly missed the Chinook, but one lucky shot had struck the side of the helicopter, causing it to release smoke.

"If we don't kill that thing first, it will kill us!" Marco said, as he got hold of a Rocket Launcher.

With precision aiming, Marco fired the Rocket Launcher at the Tetsuyuki. The projectile hits, and inflamed the starboard wing of the gunship, forcing it to crash land.

Seeing the Tetsuyuki crash-landing made the Regular Commandos breathe a sigh of relief.

"This is suh-weet, _non._" Nadia said in excitement, wanting to get back into action.

"Careful, you might just get what you asked for..." Trevor warned the French girl, knowing what she's thinking.

Yet another disturbance, this time by a Hairbuster Riberts. The Rebel heavy bomber opened its rear hatch, and standing over it was Donald Morden...

...Or rather, a robotic facsimile of the Devil Rebirth, which Marco, Fio, Trevor and Nadia have also seen before.

"I'm guessing that's one of those Morden Robots that this Amadeus guy used for his own agenda years ago..." Ralf noted.

"I have a bad feeling about this..." Clark also noted, having a frown on his face.

Before another word could be spoken, the Morden Robot on the Hairbuster Riberts fired its bazooka at the Chinook. This time the helicopter is damaged enough to force a crash land.

...

The Red Eagles Squad have their own transport too: a modified Rebel Landseek with a tarp covering its back, and drawn on the tarp was the Red Eagles' emblem.

Even while on the streets of the city, the Red Eagles can still see the Regular Commandos' Chinook being shot down, and crash landing in another section of the city.

"The Regular Commandos needs us!" Said Jason Wayne.

"Floor it, girls!" Ash Kingslayer told the female members of the Red Eagles who are driving the Landseek.

"You might want to tighten your seatbelts, or hold on to something, boys!" Jenny Wakeman responded, before she floored the pedals, sending the Landseek on a high speed drive.

"Ah, slow down! This is too fast!" Mina Kabuto panicked with the sudden burst of speed, and held on to her purple cap as tight as she could.

...

_**Mission Briefing**_

_Good Day, Red Eagles. I believe you've known about the Regular Army's war with the Rebel Army for the past decades. Well, their leader, Donald Morden has just started another campaign, but this one wasn't to take over the world, capture a piece of advanced technology, create weapons of mass destruction, or pick a bone with the Regular Army. This time, the Rebels are specifically targeting the Peregrine Falcons, SPARROWS Operatives and Ikari Mercenaries, and to make matter harder, they have allied themselves with two other factions respectively known as the Amadeus Syndicate and the Ptolemaic Army._

_So here's your mission: you will be sent to San Francisco alongside the Regular Commandos, to assist them in clearing the waves of Rebel-Amadeus-Ptolemaic Joint Forces from San Francisco, and then make your way to Alcatraz Island and destroy whatever machinery that the enemies have made specifically to deal with the Regular Commandos, and then apprehend Morden. Take note, that since their various defeats in the past, the enemies have wised up, and are using better strategies. So expect to fall into a situation where you are given no room to dodge enemy fires._

_Side note, for all future references, the Rebel-Amadeus-Ptolemaic Joint Forces will be now referred to as the RAP Army._

_..._

_Change of plans. The RAP Army were expecting the Regular Commandos, and their transport helicopter was shot down in an ambush. Find them before the RAP Army gets to them, and take out the Hairbuster Riberts if you have the opportunity._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

**MISSION ONE START!**

The Landseek came to an abrupt halt that almost launched its occupants forward with momentum.

"Next time, I'll rather take it easy..." Said Jason, trying to withhold the urge to puke.

"Agreed, buddy." Ash said in response, also resisting the urge to puke.

Up ahead, a Rebel Soldier who was in the middle of playing _Doom_ on a PSP freaked out upon seeing the Red Eagles' Landseek, and ran off leaving the portable game console behind.

"Looks like the party's about to start!" Jenny noted the situation.

"Here they come!" Mina told the other Red Eagles.

Several Rebel Soldiers arrived, some carrying rifles.

The Red Eagles effortlessly gunned down the Rebel Soldiers with their handguns, despite being outnumbered.

"Ha! Who ever said strength comes in numbers?" Jason boasted, raising his silver revolver in the air.

The mercenary in red was still oblivious to a lone Rebel Fanatic that has snuck up behind him, and the Fanatic was about to backstab him...

...Only for Ash Kingslayer to suddenly turn around and rip the Rebel Fanatic to shreds with his chainsaw. Strangely enough, the resulting blood splatter completely missed the gray-clad chainsaw-totting mercenary. "Laugh at my chainsaw, idiot!" He boasted.

"..." The other Red Eagles said nothing about it, as they took off, leaving Ash behind.

"Hey, wait for me!" Ash noticed, and went after them.

It was only a few steps before the mercenaries came across more Rebel forces. This time, a Rebel Mortar and Rebel Rifleman behind a pile of Sandbags, followed by a lone MH-6J Masknell.

Jason rushed toward the Sandbag and did a Vulcan Punch (his version includes a machete held on one hand), destroying the Sandbag in seconds. The Rebels behind it panicked for a second, and then was swiftly gunned down by the same mercenary before they can shoot back or run away.

The Masknell only got to fire three shots before it was gunned down by Jenny, dropping a **Heavy Machine Gun** in the process.

"I'll be taking this~" Mina said cheerfully, picking up the **Heavy Machine Gun**.

A few seconds later, two more Masknells appeared, followed by a T-2B Melty Honey on parachutes landing on the road behind them.

"Never a moment's rest, eh?" Jason commented on the situation.

Both Masknells are gunned down by Mina's **Heavy Machine gun**, whereas the Melty Honey has its frontal shield ripped apart by Ash's chainsaw. The single missile fired by the Melty Honey was quickly shot out of the air, and then the vehicle was promptly shot at until it explodes. The Rebel manning the vehicle jumped out in time and tried to lunge at the Red Eagles Squad with his knife raised, but finds himself flying into the business end of Jenny's Taser.

"Is this all the Rebels got?" Jenny hung a lamp on the Rebels' poor choice of tactics at the moment.

The Hairbuster Riberts suddenly flew past the Red Eagles, real close to the ground. At the same time, the mercenaries could take a good look at the Morden Robot, which was able to imitate the real Morden's signature annoying laugh.

"Gosh, even if its not the real guy, I find that laugh very annoying!" Ash gave a negative comment about it.

"You can punch him in the face later, Ash-kun." Mina told the grey-clad mercenary. "Right now, we have to find the Regular Commandos."

The Red Eagles continued with their mission, heading toward where the Regular Commandos are last seen.

...

The Red Eagles took a tight turn into another street, only to come face to face with a Girida-O. A second one appeared behind the mercenaries around the same time.

"Okay, I take that back..." Jenny regretted about the lampshading earlier, as the blue-clad female mercenary starts shooting the front Girida-O with her handgun.

Jason did his Vulcan Punch again, ripping the rear Girida-O apart in seconds. The same mini-tank exploded with its turret jumping up when the chassis is already disintegrated. "No armor can stop my fists! Much less so if I have a machete!" Jason boasted, before doing the same to the other one.

But this time, _four_ Girida-Os pulled up and surrounded the Red Eagles.

"Four? I've got a bad feeling about this..." Mina shudders, thinking of the number that is considered unlucky in her mother language.

Two Girida-Os fired upon the mercenaries, whereas two attempted to run them over.

Mina unloaded her **Heavy Machine Gun** into the Girida-Os, but only have enough ammo to destroy two of them before it went dry. The Japanese girl threw the empty weapon away, and used her handgun to continue firing at the enemies.

The remaining two Girida-Os fired another volley of shells at the mercenaries, whom manages to avoid being hit.

"Eat this!" Ash, instead of using his chainsaw, decided to throw a grenade at one of the enemy tanks, blowing it up. He immediately turns around to blow up the other one with another grenade.

Noting that the vicinity is clear, the Red Eagles continued with their trek through the city.

"Some ambush they've got there..." Jason said. "I've read from the reports that the Rebel Girida-Os attacks alone or in pairs, but never before in packs of four."

"So they really did become smarter..." Jenny said in response.

It wasn't very long before they came across a pile of rubble.

"Now climbing over this mess can be messy in itself." Ash commented about the rubble.

"It's probably just me, but does this pile of rubble seems unlikely to be caused by an explosion?" Mina wondered, feeling suspicious about the obstruction ahead.

Suddenly, the rubble exploded, sending debris flying into every direction.

When the dust cleared, two Rebel Soldiers are seen, one standing next to a plunger detonator. Both Rebels freaked out and ran past the structure that was once buried under the rubble.

"Is that..." Jason started an exclamation.

"...The..." Ash continued.

"...TETSUYUKI?!" Both Jenny and Mina ended the exclamation in unison.

**Boss battle: _Tetsuyuki_**

There was no doubt about it. The Tetsuyuki from the First Morden War is back. This time, it has a Missile Turret replacing the Rebel Mortar. Both of its wings are broken this time.

And when the crashed gunship fires its side cannons, it seems to be using the energy mortar _and _the laser cannon at the same time, as opposed to using them in two separate phases.

"Yeah, they did become smarter." Jason said, while evading the laser cannon by crouching. Having to avoid the energy shells at the same time made things harder.

The Red Eagles fired at the Tetsuyuki with their handguns, while the wrecked gunship continues to fire its energy mortar and laser cannon.

Eventually, the Tetsuyuki took enough damage that it started firing its energy mortar non-stop and its laser cannon at shorter intervals. The Missile Turret is still idling, as none of the Red Eagles are close enough to be targeted. At this point, the Red Eagles are throwing as many grenades as they can at the Tetsuyuki, for its attack pattern has become too difficult to predict.

Several grenades later, the Tetsuyuki completely falls apart with several explosions occurring over its hull. The side cannon went off with a rather huge fireball that launched the Rebel Soldier manning the Missile Turret several miles into the air.

_**Tetsuyuki **_**defeated**

"Anyone okay?" Jason asked the others.

"We're okay!" Ash responded. "That was a close one, though..."

"They've upgraded the Tetsuyuki so that it shoots faster." Jenny notes. "That means the Hairbuster Riberts may have been upgraded as well."

"Some challenge the Rebels threw at us!" Mina sulked, as she sat on the ground. "Now I know why Morden and his new friends dared the Regular Commandos specifically..."

...

As the Red Eagles continued their trek, they came across more Rebel Soldiers, along with Rebel Mortars and Rebel Riflemen behind Sandbags.

"Another day, another dead Rebel..."

Just as the mercenaries starts firing at the Sandbags, a Di-Cokka appeared behind the group of Rebels, and starts firing shells.

All it takes to avoid the shots of the Di-Cokka was to crouch. The Red Eagles did not cease firing at the Sandbags.

It takes a while until the Sandbags are destroyed, and the Rebel Mortars and Rebel Riflemen, whom haven't been able to hit the mercenaries, are quickly gunned down.

The Di-Cokka continues to fire shells even though it is rather obvious that it can't hit the crouching mercenaries.

"What an idiot..." Ash commented about the stupidity of whoever's in the tank.

One grenade toss later, the Di-Cokka exploded once, and then immediately explodes again before the driver can escape, leaving behind a **Rocket Launcher** in its wake.

"I'll be taking this." Ash said as he picked up the **Rocket Launcher**.

Taking another few steps, the group soon encountered Rebel Fanatics. Lots of Rebel Fanatics, who proceeds to swarm the Red Eagles from all directions.

The **Rocket Launcher** Ash picked up earlier proves beneficial for it blows up several Rebel Fanatics in one shot, from one direction at a time. Having to turn around for each shot is rather troublesome.

Fortunately, there's four mercenaries here, which means they can cover multiple directions at a time.

One of the Rebel Fanatics jumped down from the rooftops in an attempt to slash his knife at Mina. Unfortunately for him, the Japanese girl whips out her katana and sliced him in half.

"Just stop coming, okay?" Jenny shouted while she continues to gun down Rebel Fanatics, and any one that does gets close to her are introduced to her Taser the hard way.

After several minutes of gunning, the Rebel Fanatics stopped coming. Ash's **Rocket Launcher** is also empty by then.

"Come on, we're almost at the Regular Commandos' crash site!" Jason signaled to the others to go ahead.

As they're nearing a suspended highway with seemingly no enemies in it, the Red Eagles saw where the Regular Army Chinook has crashed, and the Hairbuster Riberts is going there too, with several minutes of headstart.

"We have to hurry!" Ash exclaimed. "The Hairbuster Riberts' about to get to them!"

"We could use those motorcycles!" Mina said, pointing a finger at two bikes conveniently parked there.

"Come on! If that plane gets to them first, they're done for!"

...

Jenny and Mina each took the driver seats of the bikes, with Jason and Ash in the passenger compartment, and gave chase to the Hairbuster Riberts.

**Boss Battle: _Hairbuster Riberts_**

The prototype heavy bomber have decided to engage the Red Eagles in combat, as it got close to them. The same Morden Robot emerged from the rear hatch, this time armed with a bazooka.

Annoyingly enough, the robotic facsimile decided to start off the battle with the Devil Rebirth's infamous laugh.

"Shut up!" Ash shouted at the Morden Robot, and starts firing at the Hairbuster Riberts together with Jason.

The Morden Robot took potshots with its bazooka, while the heavy bomber itself deploys and launches a missile at Jason and Jenny.

Jason quickly guns down the missile, but finds that the missile now frags into several shrapnel as opposed to just exploding.

"That's its upgrade?" Jenny said, while having to avoid the shrapnel.

The Hairbuster Riberts then starts dropping bouncing bombs on the Red Eagles. While Marco and Tarma's first encounter with the heavy bomber has these bombs bounce around in a predictable manner, this version has them _completely random_.

"Whoa!" Mina screamed while struggling to avoid the unpredictable bouncing bombs. So did Jenny.

The heavy bomber proceeds to deploy not one, but two missiles, and launches each of them at the two motorcycles. The missiles, luckily, flew off the bridge and exploded elsewhere.

"I prefer to fight the original!" Jason complained about this version of the Hairbuster Riberts being stronger, as he continues to pump it full of handgun bullets.

Eventually, the Hairbuster Riberts took enough damage that small explosions occurred around it. The Morden Robot's bazooka, at the same time blew up in its face after it bloated in a comical way, leaving it in its true robotic shell with a zombie-like gait. The malfunctioning robot doesn't do anything aside from doing the real Morden's infamous laugh endlessly.

"Dammit!" Ash finally had it enough with the annoying laugh, and decided to throw every grenade he has at the heavy bomber.

The Hairbuster Riberts only got to launch two more missiles before the volley of grenades damages it enough to make it crash land. The Morden Robot's head detaches just before the aircraft crashed, the head falls into Ash's hands.

"Gyah!" The grey-clad mercenary tossed the laughing head off the suspended highway, and then guns it down from midair with his handgun.

**_Hairbuster Riberts _defeated.**

"I guess that's what you get for telling the Devil Rebirth to shut up, even if its not the real one..." Mina told Ash in a deadpan manner.

Jason and Jenny couldn't help but chuckle at the funny scene.

"When I get back from this mission, Imma be a one man cheeseburger apocalypse..."

**MISSION ONE COMPLETE!**

* * *

**Afterwords**

Took a while, but I'm finally done with this chapter.

Here, the Tetsuyuki uses its energy mortar and laser cannon in conjunction in its first phase, and then the second phase has it fire the energy mortar non-stop. The Hairbuster Riberts fires frag missles, two of them, and its bouncing bombs have completely unpredictable bounce directions, that and Donald Morden/ Allen O'Neil replaced with a Morden Robot.

And that's it: the next chapter of _Metal Slug: Mercenaries_ won't start until I finish the entirety of _Fantasy Blitzkrieg: Mission Two_. So stay tuned for the next update!

Shout-out index:

*That Rebel Soldier with the PSP, playing _Doom_* - No explanations should be needed...

"...Imma be a one man cheeseburger apocalypse..." - No, Jason, don't try to be like Coach from _Left 4 Dead 2_, or else you'll become fat, what's with the gameplay mechanics of _Metal Slug_...

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	4. Chapter 3: The Rebels' New Friends

**Forewords**

Okay, I owe everyone who enjoyed the first three chapters an apology.

This chapter came _six months late_ because I've got no idea on how it can be continued after the second paragraph. Yes, this chapter was un-uploaded in my archives for that long! Along with the problem that _Fantasy Blitzkrieg_ and the new _Team Fortress 2: Mann Of Conspiracy_ were easier to write despite either of them already discussing their conspiracy theme.

* * *

**Chapter 3: The Rebels' New Friends**

Time: 1030 Hour; 30th of December, 2040

Location: Regular Chinook Crash Site; San Francisco, United States.

Arriving at the crash site of the Regular Army Chinook, the Red Eagles found the surroundings to be decimated.

The whole place looked like it was totaled by a contained war...

...But no signs of the Regular Commandos.

"Where could they be?" Jason wondered.

"Let's see it this way..." Ash said. "Either the resulting explosion completely disintegrated their corpses, or..."

The theorizing was interrupted by several gunshots that erupted from far away, accompanied with the screams of Rebel forces.

"...Or they got themselves a headstart on this mission..." Mina told the other mercenaries.

"Then let's give them a hand, everyone!" Jenny said as she rushes off toward the direction of the enemy screams. The other Red Eagles followed suit.

...

**_Mission Briefing_**

_So it turns out that the Regular Commandos didn't need your help in the first place. They even took off without you, and are giving the Rebels a run for their money._

_While the Rebels at city center are kept busy by the Regular Commandos, you Red Eagles should take downtown, take out any enemy forces in your way, and meet up with the Commandos at the Golden Gate Bridge._

_Be warned that since the entire Rebel Army is occupied in city center, your trek downtown will pit you against the Amadeus Syndicate and the Ptolemaic Army, both of which are stronger than the Rebels._

_Two Metal Slug vehicles have been deployed in the city. One near the Regular Commandos' positions, another in downtown. Use it to your advantage. Even so, watch out for the enemies' larger-sized rip-offs of the Metal Slug, respectively dubbed Formor and Metal Rear, with the latter dwarfing the Metal Slug in comparison. Destroy both of them, and then rendezvous with the Commandos._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

**MISSION TWO START!**

An Amadeus Syndicalist who was just passing by freaked out upon seeing the Red Eagles, and ran off deeper into downtown San Francisco.

"Just like the days back at Seoul. Don't you think?" Jason asked the others.

"Except that the North Koreans weren't this strong when they attacked South Korea." Ash gave the response. "That, and this is more reminiscent of Syria..."

"Who compares the Taliban with anyone else, anyway?" Jenny interrupted with a lampshade.

"Guys, can we please get back with the mission?" Mina interrupted with a reminder.

"We'll continue this conversation later..." Jason and Ash agreed to talk about things later, as they headed toward where the Amadeus Syndicalist took off, with the girls following behind them.

...

"Oh, look! An ammo crate!"

Ash kicked the ammo crate open, revealing a **Flame Shot** in it.

At exactly the same second the ammo crate burst open, a mob of Amadeus Syndicalists approached from across the street and aimed their Heavy Machine Guns at the Red Eagles.

"Say hello to my little friend!" Ash picked up the **Flame Shot**, and proceeds to fry the enemies with it. The Amadeus Syndicalists, on fire, screamed in pain before they dropped on the ground as charred corpses.

As soon as the last Amadeus Syndicalist went up in flames, a silver Di-Cokka approached the Red Eagles from directly in front, and fires a volley of three smoothbores at them.

While everyone else crouched to avoid being hit, Jason went and _Vulcan Chopped all three smoothbores out of the air with his machete_, and he was _relatively unscathed._

"I can survive anything! Even nukes!" Jason boasted, right before he went up close with the Di-Cokka and Vulcan Chopped it to pieces. The wrecked Di-Cokka promptly explodes once, and then explodes again, leaving behind nothing. "Darn, I was expecting at least a **Heavy Machine Gun**..."

...

Moving on to the next location, the Red Eagles soon encountered a Double-Decker Bus that was crashed into a building, and is used as a barricade by the Amadeus Syndicate.

"It's the Regular Army! Kill them!" One of the Syndicalist shouted.

"Oh, shut up..." Ash snarked, before he fires a single burst of **Flame Shot**, setting all the enemies on fire.

After dealing with the Syndicalists, the Red Eagles focused their firepower on the Double-Decker Bus. As the Bus was already beaten up firsthand, it didn't take too long for the combined firepower to bring it down.

Although destroying the Bus revealed another silver Di-Cokka hiding under it.

"Piece of cake!" Ash said loudly. "Leave this to me!" The silver-haired mercenary approached the Di-Cokka and is about to unleash his chainsaw on it...

...Only to jump back in surprise when a R-Shobu came out of nowhere and dropped bombs on him.

"Holy...!" Ash exclaimed, as he turns the **Flame Shot** upon the helicopter. By the time he managed to blow up the heli, the **Flame Shot **is already out of ammo.

At about the same time, the other three Red Eagles had blown up the Di-Cokka with their handguns alone.

"Ash-kun, you don't have to freak out like that..." Mina told the silver-haired mercenary.

Moving on, the Red Eagles soon came across another group of enemy soldiers hiding behind a Sandbag. These Amadeus Syndicalist are armed with **Heavy Machine Guns**. There is also a Landseek behind the group of soldiers, and it is carrying a Mounted Machine Gun manned by a Syndicalist.

Not taking any chances this time, Ash lobbed a Grenade over the Sandbag, blowing up the poor enemy soldiers before they knew what hit them. Jenny lobbed another Grenade toward the Landseek, and the Mounted Machine Gunner who saw it coming could only fire a few shots before the Landseek and him got blown up.

"Let's go help the Regular Commandos." Jason said as he led the way forward through Downtown San Francisco.

...

Moving into a relatively empty street, the Red Eagles are surprised by the lack of enemy troops in the vicinity.

"Oh, look!" Jason pointed at a First Aid Kit on the floor that laid on its side and spilled several bottle of pills over the asphalt. "I wonder how does he say it? Grabbin' Peelz?" The mercenary in red joked.

Although nobody else in the immediate area got the joke.

"Is it the right time to make such a joke?" Ash deadpanned about the joke.

As soon as Ash finishes his deadpan, something smashed through a nearby brick wall.

"There it is!" Jenny exclaimed while pointing at the new arrival. "The Formor!"

**Boss battle: _Formor_**

The Formor starts off the battle by firing its cannon once. The Red Eagles dodged the cannon shot as it blows up a wrecked car behind them.

"Destroy that cheap rip-off of the Metal Slug!"

The Red Eagles then retaliates by firing their handguns at the tank. The handgun bullets bounced off the Formor without even chipping the paint off. It then retaliates by firing another cannon shot.

The shell landed short of the Red Eagles, and the explosion did not affect any of them. What does affect them are the shrapnel that came out of the explosion which grazed each of the mercenaries slightly.

"So that's the Formor's upgrade..." Mina examined the attack. "They replaced the Armor Piercer with a Frag Shell..."

The Formor proceeds to unload its Vulcan at the Red Eagles. The mercenaries jumped to the sides to avoid the spray of bullets.

"The original Formor also have a slow-firing Heavy Sniper instead of a Vulcan." Jenny adds in.

Seeing his chance, Jason ran toward the Formor, and Vulcan Chopped it as it is about to perform a wheelie. The sudden melee-barrage caused significant damage to the tank, causing a small explosion that launched it several feet back. Said explosion also caused it to sprout small flames all over its hull.

The Formor resumes attacking, firing a volley of three cannon shells and several seconds of Vulcan unloading at the Red Eagles while jumping backwards.

The Red Eagles got down and slid forward so that the shots flew above them harmlessly.

Standing up, Ash brandished his chainsaw, and points it at the Formor. "Shoot this!" With one taunt, the silver-haired mercenary charged forward and jammed the chainsaw into the underside of the Formor just as it is about to perform another wheelie.

The chainsaw tears through the underside of the tank, possibly damaging many vital components, which caused it to get launched backwards again with another explosion. One last explosion and the Formor is transformed into a smoldering wreckage.

**_Formor_ defeated.**

"And that's why you don't rip-off someone else's design!" Jenny gave the destroyed Formor one last taunt, along with a single kick to its chassis.

...

As the Red Eagles move on toward their objectives, leaving the Formor behind, the hatch of the wrecked tank begins to unlock from the inside.

The hatch is then opened from the inside, revealing a man in his fifties wearing army camo.

_"This is Commander Jake Gyllendal reporting from Downtown._" He spoke through a radio. _"The Regular Army have hired guns doing their job for them here. Keep an eye out for them. This is what they looked like..."_

...

"A Metal Slug! About time!" Jason said upon seeing the Regular Army's signature Super Vehicle parked in the middle of the road. "Jenny, you know what to do!"

"Of course!" Jenny replies, as she jumps in to the Metal Slug.

It didn't take too long before the Red Eagles, with Jenny Wakeman driving the Metal Slug, came across another Double-Decker Bus being used as a barricade. Except that not only is this one not protected by any enemy soldiers, but it is also relatively unscathed.

"That might take a while to break down..." Mina commented on the situation.

Jason and Ash approached the Double-Decker Bus, and respectively Vulcan Chopped and chainsaw-ed the massive public transport. While at the same time, Mina and Jenny helped bring down the Bus by firing at it.

It took a long while, but the Double-Decker Bus finally gets chewed up enough that it falls apart...

...And what came from behind it is neither Rebel Army nor Amadeus Syndicate...

...Its a Ptolemaic Landseek, carrying a squad of Ptolemaic Guerillas.

"Good news: we've broke down the Double-Decker Bus that is in our way." Jason deadpanned about the change of situation. "Bad news: we're now facing the Ptolemaic Army."

The Ptolemaic Guerillas aimed and fired their Submachine Guns at the Red Eagles' general direction.

The Red Eagles dived for cover as the bullets flew over their heads.

"Shoot them!" The mercenaries then returns fire, focusing their firepower on the Ptolemaic Landseek until it blew up with the Guerillas still on the forklift-equipped flatbed.

Once again, the Red Eagles didn't move very far until they encountered more enemies. This time, a Ptolemaic Di-Cokka in the front, a Ptolemaic Girida-O at the back, and a Ptolemaic Masknell up above.

The Red Eagles are able to evade the shots from the Di-Cokka and Girida-O by crouching. The same can't be said for the Masknell.

"Take this, devil-worshipping fanatics!" Jenny yelled, as she fires a shell from the Metal Slug and annihilates the Ptolemaic Di-Cokka before it can fire another volley.

Mina took the opportunity to throw two Grenades at the Ptolemaic Girida-O. The explosion completely disintegrates the chassis, leaving behind only the cannon.

The Ptolemaic Masknell continues to fire its guns on the Red Eagles. The bullets hit the Metal Slug square on, but doesn't do much damage to it.

A few seconds of Jenny unloading the Vulcan, and the Masknell exploded mid-flight.

"Oh, yeah! Even the most powerful aircrafts are no match for the Slug!" Jason boasted loudly.

Jenny responds by gently bumping into the mercenary-in-red with the Metal Slug. "Don't be too proud. The Rebels have once managed to build a war machine that made scrap metals out of a Slug vehicle."

"Like, for example, the Metal Rear..." Ash cuts in. "Wish we have a cardboard box..."

...

The Red Eagles found themselves surrounded by Ptolemaic Fanatics as soon as they turned around a corner. Although all it takes to get out of that situation is for Jason to Vulcan Chop those from the front with his machete, and Ash to slice up those from behind with his chainsaw.

A Ptolemaic APC joins the action from the enemy side. But one Metal Slug shell from Jenny, and its a pile of burning wreckage before it gets to do its job.

"Play fair, you bastards!" Jenny taunted from inside the Metal Slug.

Another short trek later, the Red Eagles ran into a group of Ptolemaic Mortars positioned behind a pile of Sandbags. A Ptolemaic Commander gave the orders to attack, and then just ran away without a fight.

The Ptolemaic Mortars fired a volley of mortar shells at the Red Eagles. But thankfully, all of them stopped short of hitting the mercenaries.

"What's with bad guys and inaccuracies?" Jason and Ash lampshaded the phenomenon in unison.

"How should I know?" Jenny responds with snark from inside the Metal Slug. She then fires a Metal Slug shell at the nest of Mortars.

The Guerillas all have a moment of freak-out when they saw the shell coming straight for them. One of them literally took the shell right in his face as it exploded, blasting the other Guerillas into the air.

"That never gets old..." Mina comments.

...

The Red Eagles came across a third Double-Decker Bus being used as a barricade.

"I hate busses..." Jason deadpans. As he approached the Bus and prepared to Vulcan Chop it, the sound of metals being crushed came from behind the massive public transport made him change his mind. Jason opted to rejoin his friends.

"This definitely isn't good..." Jenny points out from inside the Metal Slug.

One huge explosion later, the Double-Decker Bus is blown into several pieces, and the scaled-up version of a rather familiar shape emerged from the inferno.

"Metal Rear?!" All four Red Eagles exclaimed in unison.

**Boss battle: _Metal Rear_**

The enormous Metal Slug rip-off plowed over the remains of the Double-Decker Bus, even wheelie-ing over what it can't crush further.

The Metal Rear starts off the battle by firing a huge ball of burning napalm at the Metal Slug. The Red Eagles on foot dove for cover, but the Super Vehicle took a direct hit, and Jenny is forced to abandon it before it explodes.

"We kill it until it is deader than dead!" Jason shouts, as he and the others begin unloading their handguns on the massive tank.

Unlike the Formor, the Metal Rear completely shrugs off all those bullets. It then retaliates by firing another huge fireball that, upon landing, created a blaze which lasted for seconds.

"I guess we should stay away from where the fireball lands!" Jenny told the others.

The Metal Rear then does a wheelie as it approaches the Red Eagles.

The mercenaries lobbed as many Grenades as they have at the underside of the massive red tank. The Grenades does quite a bit of damage to the chassis, but not significant enough to weaken the Metal Rear.

The Metal Rear stopped short of crushing the Red Eagles under its chassis, and then jumps back to where it started while firing its massive Vulcan at the mercenaries.

The oversized bullets of the Metal Rear's Vulcan flies over the Red Eagles' heads.

"Can't we ever fight something our own size?!" Ash shouts angrily, while lobbing another Grenade at the massive tank.

The Grenade explosion breaks off a shall chunk off the hull of the Metal Rear. The massive tank resumes its attack with yet another huge fireball.

The Red Eagles had to jump out of the way to avoid a direct hit. Even then, a small amount of napalm is still splashed upon Mina.

"Fire! Fire! Fire!" The purple-clad Japanese girl cried out, while rolling on the ground to put out the fires on her back. It takes a few seconds, but luckily, she is not hurt. "Now you've done it..." That said, Mina reached into her fanny pack and grabbed an Anti-Tank Mine she then throws at the Metal Rear. "Run over this!"

The Anti-Tank Mine landed where the massive tank will run over it. As it did, the Anti-Tank Mine exploded violently, causing enough damage to cause another explosion within the Metal Rear itself. Entering its second attack phase, the Metal Rear performs another wheelie, except that it approaches slowly while firing its Vulcan at the Red Eagles' general direction.

"Yes! Don't you hurt Mina!" It was Ash's turn to be angry. He charged forward, brandishing his chainsaw towards the Metal Rear. Amazingly enough, the chainsaw actually tore right through one of the oversized bullets without breaking, or harming its wielder. Ash proceeds to drive the chainsaw straight into the underside of the massive tank.

This attack caused enough damage to the Metal Rear that it exploded a second time from within without getting a chance to finish its current attack, and then explodes a third time, this one rendering it as a massive red _wreck_.

_**Metal Rear**_** defeated.**

"And I thought the original was tough..." Ash comments. "This upgraded version just took it to the next level..."

Jason walked in front and led the way. "Come on, guys. Golden Gate is just up front. Let's get back to our objectives."

**MISSION COMPLETE!**

* * *

**Afterwords**

Finally, I was able to post this chapter after a six month hiatus. I guess that's the problem with working on three separate stories in which the entire plot has already been planned out in advance...

The thing is: you plan too far in advance, and you'll become unable to plan what's coming right up...

As for Mina suddenly getting an Anti-Tank Mine from her inventory... Mina Kabuto, despite being a recolor of Fio, is actually a bomb expert surpassing Eri in MadSoldier's _Metal Slug History X_ sprite comic series. There's actually one scene where she jumps several feet into the air with a somersault (not sure how high in terms of _Metal Slug_ sprite sizes, but definitely higher than Leona super-jumping in _Metal Slug XX_) and drops four Tani-Oh mines on a boss enemy who is simply a recolor of a Rebel Gatling Gunner.

So, yeah, the Red Eagles' skills will be portrayed in accordance to how MadSoldier portrayed them. Same goes for all the mercenaries that will join the party later in this series, they too will have their own unique skills.

In the meantime, do check out my other stories, including _Team Fortress 2: Mann Of Conspiracy_.

Shout-out index:

"Say hello to my little friend!" - "Hey, that's my line!" ~Tony Montana, _Scarface_.

"I can survive anything! Even nukes!" - Not so much of a shout-out as a nod to canon material. This line is copied straight from one of Ralf's lines from _The King Of Fighters_.

"...Grabbin' peelz..." - "Peelz here!" ~Louis, _Left 4 Dead_.

"Wish we have a cardboard box..." - I would be cool to have Solid Snake from _Metal Gear_ as a guest character in _Metal Slug_...

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	5. Chapter 4: Meet The Devil Rebirth

**Forewords**

Wow, the previous chapter was posted with exactly 3333 words. Very much a coincidence, don't you think?

Anyways, with the previous chapter finally posted after being in my archives for six months, I can get this series going again at a regular pace.

Given the length of each chapter, expect this story to take over a year to finish. So please wait patiently, as I have the other two stories to update as well.

* * *

**Chapter 4: Meet The Devil Rebirth**

Time: 1200 Hour; 30th of December, 2040.

Location: Golden Gate Bridge; San Francisco, United States.

The Red Eagles were surprised to see what is laid out in front of them.

Rebel Soldiers, Amadeus Syndicalists, Ptolemaic Guerillas, and their various machineries laid all over the San Francisco end of the Golden Gate Bridge, all mangled up beyond recognition and/or on fire.

Looking ahead, they can see a Jet Hammer-Yang carrying the Regular Commandos speeding off toward Alcatraz Island. Behind them were a trail of Ptolemaic Jet Hammer-Yangs and Flying Taras, all shot down by the Regular Commandos.

"Man..." Jason Wayne comments on the sight. "Why are the four of us even here?"

"Following orders..." Ash Kingslayer answers. "But yeah, maybe we should ask Regular Army Command after the mission..."

"At least we still have a way of following them." Jenny Wakeman then points toward a docked Hammer-Yang.

"Let's go, guys! They're stealing the spotlight!" Mina Kabuto told everyone as she rushed toward the Hammer-Yang first.

The other Red Eagles said nothing more and followed...

...

Location: Mission Control, Regular Army Command.

"Sir, it seems that the Rebel-Amadeus-Ptolemaic Joint Forces are not acing alone." A Regular Army technician said. "I'm picking up an encrypted transmission entering Alcatraz Island where Morden, Amadeus and the Ptolemaic Boss are currently hiding out.

It is hard to tell if the AI Commanding Officer is actually paying attention, due to being just a block of CPU with a camera for an eye. But judging by his reaction, he certainly did. "An encrypted transmission? Can you decrypt it?"

"I can't sir..." The technician replies. "This encryption isn't just beyond me, its beyond even the Future Rebels. In fact, I think even the Martians and Venusians are not capable of such a level of encryption..."

If an AI is capable of showing surprise, the AI CO definitely just did. "Beyond even the aliens?"

"That's right, sir." The technician said. "Every time I try crunching even one digit in the encryption, it somehow reformat all of itself into a completely random set of digits. The world has never seen anything like this before..."

"So it seems that there's something about our old enemies that we still don't know about..." The AI CO "thought" for a while. "Keep working on it, Mr..."

Seeing that the AI CO doesn't know his name, the technician told him, "The name's Leon Chi-Ming Chan, sir."

...

_**Mission Briefing**_

_We have the Devil Rebirth - Donald Morden himself cornered in the basement floor of the Alcatraz Prison. Or so we thought..._

_As the Regular Commandos blast their way through the RAP-occupied prison island, you should take advantage of the ensuing chaos, and infiltrate a different section of the compound than the Commandos. That way, the enemies will be forced to divert their firepower over two different spots, making it easier to mow them down as you all approach Morden and his allies._

_But beware, Red Eagles. Since the Devil Rebirth specifically dared the Regular Commandos to come and get him here, I expect there to be a multitude of traps waiting for the Commandos to trigger them. Just to be safe, make sure you get to the end of the compound before the Commandos does. That way, Morden and his allies will be surprised to see someone they don't know coming to get them._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

**MISSION THREE START!**

Location: High Security Dock, Alcatraz Island.

"Listen, you asshole!" A lone Rebel Soldier yelled at his mobile phone. "I don't know who you are, but I will find you, and I will kill you!"

Said Rebel Soldier proceeds to throw the phone on the ground, causing it to break into pieces. At the very same second he did so, he took a bullet to the head and died instantly, courtesy of Jason Wayne.

"Okay, guys. Hit... err, Morden is hiding in the lowest floor along with Amadeus and whatever the Ptolemaic Boss calls himself, waiting for the Regular Commandos to spring the trap they have laid." Jason told his friends. "Our objectives is to get to the bad guys first and disarm whatever traps they have laid that are clearly not meant for us. Once we do so and apprehend them, we'll leave the rest to the Regular Commandos."

"I can't wait to kick Morden's ass!" Ash announces excitingly, while showing off his chainsaw.

As soon as the Red Eagles stepped off the Hammer-Yang, they are greeted by a large mob of Rebel Riflemen approaching from the main entrance of the Alcatraz Prison Compound.

"Man, that's a lotta Riflemen." Ash points out. "But no matter, we'll kill them all."

The Red Eagles proceeds to slowly gun down the mob of Rebel Riflemen whilst the latter continues to fire shots that don't hit their intended targets.

It took a full minute until the mob of Riflemen are completely gunned down. But as soon as the last one drops, the Red Eagles are greeted by a squad of Masknell Regiment flying above their heads and raining down bullets on them.

"What, now?!" Jenny exclaims.

"Just destroy them!" Jason calls out to the others, and begins firing at the red-painted lead Masknell.

Everyone follows suit and fires their handguns at the Masknell Regiment Leader while dodging incoming fire. After about two minutes, the Masknell Regiment Leader is blown up, setting off a chain reaction that took out the rest of the Regiment.

"Multi-kill! Yeah!" Mina announces.

With no more enemies pestering them, the Red Eagles made their way into the Alcatraz Prison Compound.

...

Location: Morden's Fake Hideout, beneath the Alcatraz Prison Compound.

Although the Red Eagles don't know, their entering the Alcatraz is caught on tape by a Supervisory Camera which is then viewed by the Devil Rebirth - Donald Morden himself.

"Curse the Regular Army!" The leader of the Rebel Army said furiously. "I challenged them to specifically send Marco and his friends at me, yet they cheated by hiring these Mercenaries to do their dirty job!"

Amadeus, who is watching the same footage had a different response than Morden. "Life is never fair, after all. Take for example, on the fact that the Regulars have beaten the Future Rebels despite the massive difference in technology levels..."

Morden slammed an old computer terminal with his fist in anger. "Grr... Is there nothing that can stop the Regular Army for good?!" The Devil Rebirth then turned toward the third person in the Fake Hideout - the Ptolemaic Boss. "You, say something..."

The Ptolemaic Boss did not utter a single word. He just stood there silently.

"It seems that this fellow here choose to be silent..." Amadeus told Morden.

Morden's sole response is to turn back toward the security footages. He then adds, "Nevertheless, I will crush those puny Commandos and their new allies with my newest super weapon!"

...

Location: Section 1 Prison Cells, Alcatraz Prison Compound.

"This. Is. SPARTA!" An insane inmate suddenly yelling like that from behind bars surprised the Red Eagles as they walked past him.

"You. Shut. UP!" Jenny responds and proceed to Taser the inmate for a ten full seconds.

"You do know that attacking irrelevant people, even if its an insane inmate, is going to cost us our reputation with the Regulars?" Jason reminded the blue-haired female Mercenary.

"If they do that to me, I don't care who I attack." Was Jenny's reply.

The Red Eagles walked down the corridor for a meter uninterrupted, until they came across a Ptolemaic Gunner Unit that is facing away from where the mercenaries approached.

"Right, guys..." Ash told his friends. "I'm gonna use this **Shotgun** which someone conveniently left here, and pump the back of that thing full of lead, without it realizing what happened." That said, the silver-haired mercenary slowly approached the Gunner unit from behind with his **Shotgun** ready at hand. He got really close to stealth-killing the mech, until...

...Ye another insane inmate, this one in a cell behind the Gunner Unit interrupted the silence.

"Fegelein! Fegelein! FEGELEIN!"

This insane inmate's ranting toward Ash alerted the Gunner Unit to his position.

"Oh, shit..." Ash could only utter softly. He quickly unloads a **Shotgun** shell point-blank into the Gunner Unit's single mechanical eye right as it is about to punch him.

The point-blank shot totally mission-kills the Gunner Unit. It explodes once from within, and then its limbs all detaches before it goes up in a bigger explosion which Ash is able to dodge in time.

"So much for a stealth-kill, buddy..." Jason told Ash.

That being said, a group of Ptolemaic Special Force Troopers arrived and have converged on the Red Eagles' location.

"Now what?" Mina asked the others.

A third insane inmate in a cell next to the second one's appeared all of a sudden. "I need scissors! 61!"

"She didn't ask you, punk..." Jason said as he guns down the insane inmate with his handgun.

The moment Jason fires that shot is the moment the Special Force Troopers starts rushing toward the Red Eagles with their knives.

"This has just got a whole lot harder..."

...

Several minutes later...

"Well, whad'dya know? We've survived!" Jason told the others while standing in the middle of the corridor that is covered in Special Force Trooper corpses.

"Wait, how did we?" Ash was confused as to the current situation.

"If we're in a work of fiction, maybe the Fourth Wall is responsible." Jenny tries to explain.

Mina turns toward a particular direction that doesn't seems to have anything interesting or relevant, and said. "_Baka..._"

...

Location: Section 2 Prison Cells, Alcatraz Prison Compound.

As the Red Eagles proceeds deeper into Alcatraz, they soon find themselves face-to-face with a Melty Honey positioned in front of an Iron Iso.

"At least this one's easier..." Ash comments, as he spends the last shell in the **Shotgun** to mission-kill the Melty Honey before it can attack. The ensuing explosion completely disintegrates the Rebel Soldier driving it.

The Iron Iso fires a single ball of energy which the Red Eagles easily avoids by just walking toward the tank that fired it. The shot lands several feet behind the mercenaries without hitting anybody.

Jason and Ash then Vulcan Chops and chainsaw-slashes the Iron Iso at the same time. The turret of the tank explodes, leaving behind an empty chassis.

"Now, who else wants to fight us!" Jason boasts loudly, as he raises his machete above his head.

"I will!" A familiar voice made himself known to the Red Eagles. That said, Allen O'Neil entered the corridor from the topmost platform, brandishing his signature M60 machine gun as well as making his also-signature laugh.

**Boss Battle: _Allen O'Neil_**

"That's Allen, Morden's right hand man." Jason told his friends. "The most muscular loudmouth in the Rebel Army."

Unfortunately for Jason, Allen heard that all. "Who are you calling muscular loudmouth?! I'll send you home to mommy!"

The bare-chested muscle-head's first response is to throw a grenade at the Red Eagles. This grenade came out very fast, and the mercenaries barely manages to avoid being hit.

"Fly, boy!" Allen throws another set of four grenades at the Red Eagles.

Jason, Ash and Jenny manages to dodge the first three grenades by jumping over or sliding under them...

Mina, on the other hand, manages to deflect the fourth grenade back to Allen, with her _bare hands_. "Return to sender!"

Allen dodges his own grenade by jumping down from the higher platform onto the floor.

"Not bad, girl..." Allen quips. "But try deflecting this!" He then fires his machine gun at Mina.

The purple-clad Japanese girl only manages to avoid being hit by being pulled out of the way by Ash.

"Thanks." Mina thanked Ash for saving her.

The Red Eagles then retaliates by throwing their own grenades at Allen. Not surprisingly, Allen survives having all four grenades exploding right next to him...

And the ensuing smokescreen had allowed him to run up close to the Red Eagles. "You're mincemeat!" Said Allen, as he prepares to whip his ammo belt at the mercenaries.

Jason and Ash quickly responds by standing up and Vulcan Chops and chainsaw-slash him before he can attack.

Allen certainly couldn't withstand such damage. "Good job, Red Eagles! You're as good as the Regular Army's archives said! I'll see you in hell!" He yelled out before dropping on the floor in his own pool of blood.

_**Allen O'Neil**_** defeated**

The Red Eagles decided to play it safe, and poke Allen to check for any pulse.

"Pretty sure it's irrelevant to check his pulse, seeing how he comes back from the dead all the time..." Jason lampshades Allen's supposed immortality.

"But wait!" Jenny suddenly points out. "_How_ did he know we are the Red Eagles? This mission is our first one against them, and our names have never been revealed to the public before."

"Hey, guys..." Ash said. "Remember how Morden and his new buddies _specifically_ asked for the Regular Commandos? I mean, not just any Commandos, but those nine folks specifically..."

"Which might mean that we're getting ourselves involved in a _Metal Gear_-styled conspiracy..." Mina continues the sentence.

...

Location: Morden's Fake Hideout, beneath the Alcatraz Prison Compound.

Morden and his allies watched a live footage of the Red Eagles entering a stairway that leads to the lower floors of the Alcatraz Prison Compound.

"Every minute we sit here and watch, the Regular Army's hired guns gets closer to us!" Morden ranted to himself as he watches the footage.

"On the other hand..." Amadeus added. "The Regular Commandos are occupied by our traps as planned..." He looked at a different live footage which showed the Regular Commandos trying their best to fight a mob of Rebel-Amadeus-Ptolemaic Joint Forces troops.

"But those so-called Red Eagles are not part of the original plans!" Morden rants about the situation. "That bastard-of-a-President Baltazar Drippiek never plays fair, as usual! Why did I vote for his presidency back then?!"

...

Location: Section 3 Prison Cells, Alcatraz Prison Compound.

As soon as the Red Eagles comes out of the stairway into the lower floor, they are 'greeted' by a Ptolemaic Claw Unit rushing toward them.

"Nope!" Jason throws a Grenade at the Claw Unit before it gets close enough to punch anyone. The Claw Unit explodes once, falls apart, and then explodes again. "Alright, guys, let's go."

Just a few steps later, the Red Eagles ran into an ambush consisting of Gunner Units and Claw Units from both directions.

"I thought the Ptolemaic Army could do better than this?" Jenny comments.

A few seconds and several shots later, the Red Eagles moved on, leaving behind a pile of destroyed mechs.

"What else could they possibly send at us?" Ash tempted the situation.

A lone Ptolemaic Officer appeared in front of the Red Eagles. After the Officer gives his command, a large numbers of Fanatic Bikers, both Rebel and Ptolemaic, drove into the corridor while performing a wheelie.

"Oh, come on!" All four Red Eagles said a the same time, as they tries to gun down the Fanatic Bikers.

A few Fanatic Bikers are blown up before they could jump off their bikes. The resulting explosion set them on fire and kills them. At about the same time, the Officer freaked out and had already left the scene.

More Fanatic Bikers kept coming through the corridor, and more kept getting blown up by the Red Eagles. Only a few had managed to toss their bikes and continue the fight on foot, and even then the Red Eagles shot those thrown bikes out of the air, and gunned down the bikers before they can continue attacking.

The Fanatic Bikers swarm lasted for several minutes. By then, there were motorbike parts and burnt corpses strewn all over the place.

"Next time I see someone performing a wheelie on a bike..." Ash mumbled under his breath.

...

Location: Unidentified Extension, Alcatraz Prison Compound.

The Red Eagles continued their trek through RAP-controlled Alcatraz Prison until they found themselves in a room none of them could identify.

"Uhh... I may know very little about Alcatraz..." Jason points out to everyone. "...But this room certainly isn't part of the original blueprint."

There were multiple Supervisory Cameras hanging off the ceilings, but all were positioned in a way that made them easy to avoid. There is also a Slug Gunner conveniently placed in the center of the room, and it is overlooking the opposite end of the room where a bulkhead stands. Said bulkhead bore the Rebel Army's insignia along with the Amadeus Syndicate and Ptolemaic Army's.

"This is too easy..." Jenny took suspicion of the features of the room. "This must be the trap laid by Morden, Amadeus and the Ptolemaic Boss..."

The mercenaries looked around the room for anything else. Aside from the Supervisory Cameras and unmanned Slug Gunner, there is nothing else in there to be vary of.

"They even left a **Laser Gun** lying on the floor..." Ash said as he picks up the **Laser Gun**. "What have they built that will assure their defeating the Regular Commandos?"

That being said, Ash proceeds to gun down the Supervisory Cameras with the **Laser Gun**. All of them, leaving behind loose wires hanging out of their harnesses.

"You'll have to do better than this, Morden!" Ash taunted the Devil Rebirth, even though he had no idea exactly where he is.

The other Red Eagles all turned toward the grey-clad chainsaw-totting mercenary and gave him the look.

"You _baka_!" Mina chided Ash for what he just said. "You should not have tempted fate!"

As that is said, the bulkhead slowly opened, and out came no other than the Devil Rebirth - Donald Morden himself, seated at the top of his saucer-shaped tank while holding a bazooka.

...At least, that's what Morden and his allies wanted the Red Eagles to think. The Red Eagles quickly noticed that the infamous madman they are currently looking at is a Morden Robot double.

"Someone need to remind Morden that his robot double looked very shoddy..." Jenny hangs a lamp about the Morden Robot's appearance.

The robot double in question does Morden's signature laugh (much to the Red Eagles' annoyance), prompting someone to hang another lamp.

"You know, that infamous laugh is kind of getting old already..." Such was Jason's take on it.

**Boss Battle: _Morden Saucer_**

The Morden Robot manning the saucer-shaped tank showed no emotional response to Jason's lampshade-hanging insult. Its physical response, on the other hand, is to fire its bazooka at the Red Eagles.

Instead of evading the shot, the Red Eagles shot it out of the air with their guns.

"Say hello to my little friend!" Ash chewed the scenery as he fires the **Laser Gun** at the Morden Saucer.

The Morden Robot responds by firing another rocket at Ash. He simply adjusted his aim to vaporize the rocket.

Seeing the second bazooka shot failing to hit its target, the Morden Saucer deployed a Gatling Gun (which emerged from the position of the Rebel Army insignia on the vehicle), and starts firing a volley of large-caliber rounds at the Red Eagles.

The mercenaries had a tiny bit of trouble evading the volley. But they manages it anyway.

"You missed!" Jason chews the scene even further, as he throws a Grenade at the Morden Saucer.

The Grenade hits the saucer-shaped vehicle directly, but doesn't do immediate visible damage to it.

It was then that the Morden Saucer suddenly begins to hover above the ground, with no visible means of propulsion anywhere on it.

"I know it wasn't supposed to be surprising since this thing really did fly back when the Regular Commandos ended the Venusian Invasion." Jenny points out as she approaches the parked Slug Gunner and tries to enter it. "But I still have a bad feeling about this..."

After hovering about 5 meters into the air, the Morden Saucer suddenly slammed down on the ground, creating a shockwave that travelled at every direction on the horizontal axis.

"HOLY SH...!" The entire Red Eagles Squad practically shouted in unison when they saw such an unexpected attack being employed.

Jenny, who is in the Slug Gunner is not harmed by the shockwave. The Slug Gunner itself, on the other hand, took a bit of damage. The rest of the Red Eagles weren't able to evade it, and got knocked off their feet, but they are otherwise unhurt.

"Jeez, we totally did 'Nazi' that coming..." Ash comments while trying to get back up. He tries to fire at the Morden Saucer, only to find out that the **Laser Gun** is out of juice.

"Ow... Iceland was painless compared to this..." Mina complains as well.

Jenny moved the Slug Gunner right next to the Morden Saucer, and proceeds to pummel it with one strike of the pile bunker. The melee attack only caused a dent on the saucer-shaped vehicle, but its still a start. "Eat this!" This time, the blue-haired female mercenary chews the scene.

The Morden Robot's sole response is to shoot the Slug Gunner once with its bazooka. The shot creates a similar dent on the bipedal Slug vehicle.

Jenny, in the Slug Gunner continues to pummel the exact same spot of the Morden Saucer with the pile bunker, whereas the Morden Saucer shoots at the Slug Gunner with its Gatling Gun. The fight continued for a while as the other Red Eagles just stood back and watched.

Several pile bunker strikes later, a gaping hole has been created on the hull of the Morden Saucer. But the Slug Gunner has taken so much damage at the same time it can't take much more either.

"Even if you're not the real guy, I would like to see you burn!" Jenny hams it up one last time, before firing a Cannon shell straight into the gaping hole point-blank.

The resulting explosion completely crippled the Morden Saucer, and burned off the rubber face of the Morden Robot, revealing a skull-like robot face underneath.

Jenny jumped out of the Slug Gunner just before the Morden Saucer explodes again, this time completely. As with the Hairbuster Riberts back in the city, the Morden Robot's head flew off its body, and landed on the floor, rolling toward Jason's feet.

"Oh, come on!" Ash went and kicked the head into the air like a soccer ball just as it starts sprouting Morden's infamous laugh endlessly.

"Totally agree with you, buddy." Jason said and then shoots the head out of the air with his handgun.

_**Morden Saucer **_**defeated.**

"And another point for the Red Eagles Squad!" The Red Eagles grouped up and posed together.

A weird tingling feeling prompts the mercenaries to turn toward the door which they entered the room from. There stood the Regular Commandos, all watching with deadpan on their face.

"And these are the guys and girls Regular Command said will be helping us?" Marco deadpans even further.

The rest of the Regular Commandos proceeds to discuss with each other about the Red Eagles. The Red Eagles themselves needed not listen to the dialogues to know that the Commandos were saying things about them. The Ikari Mercenaries' discussion, in particular, made Jason felt like he was stabbed in the back with a knife made of humiliation.

"Come on! After everything you guys went through, wouldn't it be nice to have assistance for once!" Ash calls out on the Regular Commandos to silence them.

**MISSION COMPLETE!**

...

Location: Morden's Fake Hideout, beneath the Alcatraz Prison Compound.

"Damn it!" The real Donald Morden cursed. "I've set up this trap so that I can end those meddling Regular Commandos forever, and in the end the trap is set off and promptly destroyed by this so-called Red Eagles Squad!" Morden turns around, as he prepares to address his allies...

...Only to find out that Amadeus has hastily boarded Morden's Hi-Do helicopter. The Ptolemaic Boss, on the other hand, seems to have literally disappeared into thin air.

"You can finish your rants somewhere else..." Amadeus told the Rebel Army's leader. "Unless you want to be humiliated by the Regular Army again..."

Amadeus didn't get to finish his sentence, and Morden wasn't able to ask where he was going, due to an expected interruption.

"You have nowhere to go, Morden!" Marco called out. "Surrender and face justice!"

Morden turned and faced the Regular Commandos whom have found their way into his hideout. He seemed calm for someone who was just freaking out about being captured by these people seconds ago.

"You and your 'justice'. Hmph! Its because of that goddamned Regular Army that my son is dead!" Morden said. "President Baltazar Drippiek is not fit to run the United States!"

Marco was disgusted at the madman's rant just now.

"Then why did you vote for him back then?" Tarma delivers his line regarding the rant.

"President Drippiek was favored by everyone because he helped end the Middle Eastern terrorists for good, as well as convincing North Korea to cease all hostility with the rest of the world. But back then I didn't know he achieved those goals by playing dirty!" Morden gives his answer.

"What do you mean by 'playing dirty'?" Fio retaliates verbally. "Isn't that your way of doing things?"

"How about the White Baby Crisis your friend, Amadeus released into the Internet?" Trevor added his comments in.

At this point, Morden had given up on his argument. "Then it seems that I have to go with Plan B..."

"What Plan B?" Ralf was confused about Morden's statement.

Amadeus suddenly poked out of the Hi-Do helicopter, holding what appeared to be a flare gun in his hand. "This is the Plan B General Morden is talking about!"

With a pull of the flare gun's trigger, the hideout emitted a bright flash that stayed active for an entire minute, blinding the Regular Commandos in the process. By the time the flash died down, Morden, Amadeus and the Hi-Do helicopter is nowhere to be seen, and the ceiling has been replaced with a gaping hole that led all the way back to the surface. The tip of one of the Golden Gate Bridge's tower supports is visible through this mile-wide hole.

"Damn, he got away again!" Marco cursed. "We better report back to Command, tell them that Morden's not done with his plans..." He thought for a while before adding in "...And tell them how the so-called Red Eagles stole our spotlight..."

* * *

**Afterwords**

Whew, what a wall of text...

The last paragraph of this chapter shouldn't come as a surprise to you. There's no way the story would've ended in just three missions.

Quick character note: President Baltazar Drippiek is the true antagonist of the _Metal Slug History X_ web comic series. You should be able to tell at first glance of his name that he's going to be a future big bad if you've read MadSoldierProduction's comics. That's why I didn't even bother to hide his identity. Also, Leon Chi-Ming Chan is an OC created by Soldier Of The Future right here in Fanfiction Dot Net. Special thanks to him.

And so it appears that the Rebel-Amadeus-Ptolemaic Joint Forces are not the only ones in the works here. But who could've used the encrypted frequency that is beyond even the Future Rebels?

Shout-out index:

"This. Is. SPARTA!" - "You. Should. Have. Got. This. ALREADY!" ~King Leonidas the First, _300_.

"Fegelein! Fegelein! FEGELEIN!" - _Hitler Rants_ about not being able to meet Fegelein.

"I need scissors! 61!" - "I hear its amazing when the famous purple stuffed worm on Flap-Jaw space with the tuning fork does a raw blink on Hara-Kiri Rock..." ~AI!Colonel, _Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons Of Liberty_.

"I did 'Nazi' that coming..." - Yet another one from _Hitler Rants_. This one is from _Hitler is trapped on a roller coaster_.

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	6. Chapter 5: It Deepens

**Forewords**

Okay, to tell you the truth, this story won't end with the defeat of the RAP Joint Forces...

There will be over a dozen more factions that the Regulars are going to deal with much later.

What are those factions? Well, you'll have to read on to find out...

* * *

**Chapter 5: It Deepens...**

Time: 1500 Hour; 30th of December, 2040.

Location: Mission Control, Regular Army Command.

"So it seems that the madman, Morden, and his new friends have everything planned in advance..." The AI CO said.

"Well, sir, if that's the case, I do believe there is something even more sinister going on with Morden and his buddies." Marco gave his opinion on the matter.

"The whole 'take over Alcatraz' plan of his turned out to be just a ruse to test and see if the Regular Army would 'play dirty'..." Tarma added in.

The camera that served as the AI CO's eye turned toward the big screen at the opposite end of the Mission Control room for a few seconds, then back at the Regular Commandos. "And we did cheat... by sending in the Red Eagles Squad as backup when Morden specifically asked for just you bunch..."

"So what might that guy be planning, anyway?" Eri raises a question.

"To have his revenge against the Government?" Fio suggested.

The AI CO 'stared' at the Regular Commandos for a short while. "No, Ms Germi. The RAP Joint Forces still want to kill off you bunch specifically. They just took their personal revenge to the next level..."

"So, where have they gone to now?" Trevor wonders about what is coming next.

"Knowing what he has planned before, Morden could be anywhere in the world right now!" Nadia adds.

The AI CO turned toward the big screen, which is now displaying a map of the region between northern India and western China.

"Are they hiding out in the Himalayas?" Clark wonders as he watched the satellite feed.

"More precisely, _inside_ Everest." The AI CO corrected. The big screen spawned a green crosshair that focused on a particular peak in the Himalayas. "The RAP Joint Forces have somehow managed to hollow out Mount Everest in the past year without causing any geological anomaly to it, and even we have no idea what is going on until a civilian hiker who had the weird idea of bringing a Geiger Counter with him detected a large amount of unidentified Radioactive particles, which according to him weren't there when he last hiked Everest a year ago with the same Geiger Counter."

"Hollowed out Everest? Really?!" Ralf was totally befuddled by what he just heard. "Even Rugal Bernstein isn't that crazy!"

Leona gave no comment. The blue-haired Ikari Mercenary chose to stay silent for the moment.

"You may not like this..." The AI CO said apologetically. "But President Drippiek has just informed Command about his plans for the mission. He said that he wants the Red Eagles for this mission, and that you bunch are to stay in Command..."

The sudden announcement ignited argument amongst the Regular Commandos.

"Those so-called Red Eagles are stealing our spotlight again!"

...

_**Mission Briefing**_

_Good day, Red Eagles. Regular Command and The Government sends their thanks to you for assisting in the liberation of San Francisco and Alcatraz Prison from the clutches of the RAP Joint Forces._

_However, the ordeal is not over yet. We will brief you on your next objectives in a moment..._

_According to intel, the RAPs have somehow hollowed out Mount Everest in the past year, and built a base inside of it without anyone in the world noticing until now._

_We don't know how that is possible, for nothing in the world should be able to do that, not even the aliens and Future Rebels. But regardless, we are not taking any chances, and it is your job to infiltrate the base and destroy everything belonging to the enemy you see in there. At this point, Morden and his friends are such great threat that not collapsing Mount Everest in the process of your mission has became irrelevant to President Balthazar Drippiek's interest._

_Scans have also indicated the presence of Slug vehicles inside the base, we still don't know what they are planning with them and why, but see if you can recapture or, failing that, destroy the Slugs so that the RAPs cannot build a countermeasure..._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

Time: 1730 Hour.

Location: Somewhere over the Himalayas.

A Regular Army B-52 plane flew over the Himalayas, at such a height that its fuselage might as well be grazing the vacuum of outer space.

"Who has the crazy idea of hollowing out Everest?!" Inside the plane, Jason Wayne hung a lamp on how impossible the main point of the current mission should be.

"According to geological science, hollowing out an entire mountain should not be possible..." Jenny Wakeman points out. "Digging out part of a mountain, possible but difficult. But hollowing an entire mountain? No way..."

"Ah, who cares if they hollow out an entire landmark? The RAPs are a bunch of lunatics and they need to be stopped, anyway." Ash Kingslayer interrupted nonchalantly.

"But the next question is: how will we get to Everest?" Mina Kabuto raises a question.

The purple-clad Japanese girl's question is answered in an announcement of the B-52 pilot.

_"This is your pilot - Flynn Taggart speaking. We're not gonna land in Kathmandu Airport. Regular Command thinks that the RAPs may have taken over Nepal, and have troops stationed down there. You're going to have to HALO Jump onto the peak of Everest."_

That announcement produced a drop of cold sweat over each of the Red Eagles mercenaries' foreheads.

"Wait, HALO Jump, as in High-Altitude Low-Opening?" Jason stuttered as he asked the pilot.

The pilot did not respond, as the cargo bay door of the B-52 opens in midair.

_"We're right above Mount Everest right now. Its now or never, Red Eagles!"_ The pilot, Flynn Taggart said.

Jason stood up from his seat, with a parachute pack worn on his back. "Ah, well. We've seen worse deployment methods, such as Libya back in the day..."

...

**MISSION FOUR START!**

Location: Peak of Mount Everest.

The Red Eagles' HALO Jumping onto Mount Everest went smoothly, if one counts the scene where a lone Rebel Soldier standing guard on a suspended metal walkway took a bullet at the top of his head which then exits through his groin.

The mercenaries carefully maneuvered themselves onto the walkway, and landed silently. Well, as silently as landing on metal walkways would allow. Upon landing, their parachutes packed themselves back into the backpacks.

"Keep those chutes with us, guys..." Jason told his friends. "Given where we are right now, its probably a good idea to keep them with us at all time."

Jenny and Mina peered over the railings that separated anyone walking on the walkways. They find themselves so high above solid ground that they felt like their legs were going soft.

"That was a very long drop..." Jenny shudders at thinking about the height. "Best that we all stay on the walkways..."

And with that, the Red Eagles proceeded with their trek downhill. The metal walkways appear to be a recent addition, as indicated by the lack of snow piling on it. There were also portions where the walkways just ended abruptly, forcing the mercenaries to make long distance jumps using their chutes to slow their descend onto walkways that are at lower elevations.

The Red Eagles soon found a weapon crate just sitting on top of an unfinished walkway they jumped onto. Breaking it open revealed a **Sniper Rifle**.

"A **Sniper Rifle**? Ain't got much chance to shoot enemies at long distance if you can't see them until they show up next to you." Jason said, as he picks up the **Sniper Rifle**.

As soon as he picks up the weapon, the Red Eagles are met with several Rebel Riflemen and Rebel Bazookas standing on a walkway across a manageable gap.

"Oh, come on!" Ash complains. "The Regular Commandos fought fewer enemies back then!"

The Rebels only got to fire a few shots before Ash blew them all up with a single Grenade, somehow not causing the walkway to collapse.

"Well, let's go before things get any worse."

...

The Red Eagles soon came across a portion of the walkways that required them to descend several dozen meters downwards. Good thing they have their parachutes with them. They descended slowly toward that walkway using their parachutes with no problem...

...Until they are attacked by two Ptolemaic Masknells the instant they landed.

"Ah, well. Life's life..." Ash deadpans about the situation, as he opens fire on the helicopters.

Jason took aim with the **Sniper Rifle**, and fired at one of the Ptolemaic Masknells. The shot happened to score a headshot on one of the pilots, which translated as that Ptolemaic Masknell crashing down without even firing a shot.

"Wow, this gun is amazing..."

The second Ptolemaic Masknell maneuvers around and fires a small volley upon the Red Eagles. While the shots are certainly harder to avoid than the Rebels' Masknells, they are still easy to avoid.

Jason took this chance to shoot at the helicopter. This shot also scored a headshot on the pilot, which might as well destroy the Ptolemaic Masknell out right.

"I love this gun!" Jason announces to his friends.

Four more Ptolemaic Masknells arrived at the scene.

"At this point, they're going to end up deploying so much troops that they won't have enough room to even look around." Jenny comments on the situation.

Four **Sniper Rifle** shots later, those four Ptolemaic Masknells ceased to exist. One of them dropped an **Enemy Chaser**.

...

As they proceeded through the incomplete walkways, the Red Eagles soon find themselves looking through one that is guarded by a row of Bull Chan tanks on the walkways above, and a Bradley right across the gauntlet of Bull Chan tanks.

"Now that is going to be a difficult one..." Jason comments on the situation. He tries to get right next to the Bradley where its blind spot is, but that very blind spot makes him an easy target for the Bull Chan tanks, and he decided against it.

"Ash, use that **Enemy Chaser** of yours!" Jason called out.

"Got it!" Ash then fires the **Enemy Chaser** without bothering to aim. The mini missiles automatically homed in on to the closest thing to the Red Eagles. In that case, the Bull Chan tanks.

Ash went through a large amount of **Enemy Chaser **ammo before the Bull Chan tanks are blown up. He then spends the rest of them on the Bradley while standing outside its firing range, blowing it up as well.

"Sometimes you get a power-up that you expect to spend over the course of a stage, only to use it up completely just one scene later..." The grey-clad mercenary hangs a lamp.

...

As the Red Eagles proceeded forward, they are unaware of the presence of an odd-looking Rebel Soldier equipped with an abnormally advanced loadout watching them from behind. Said Rebel wasn't there when the mercenaries walked by that spot.

The odd Rebel watched the Red Eagles making their way down a slope before he... teleported out of that spot.

...

Unfortunately for the Red Eagles, they soon find themselves running down a slope while chased by Rebel Soldiers that are pushing huge snowballs. The slope is too steep for them to jump over the huge snowballs, which for some reason are resistant to even Grenades.

"Go! Go! Go! Go! Go!" Ash called out to the others to run down the slope as fast as they can.

"Up there!" Mina pointed at a metal platform suspended above the slope that is within jumping distance.

All four Red Eagles jumped onto that platform just as the huge snowball is grazing Jason's back.

"Whew. A second slower and I'll be joining one of those missing Everest hikers down below..." The red-clad mercenary lamented.

The Red Eagles watched more huge snowballs rolling down the slope with Rebel Soldiers pushing them. Somehow the Rebels have an endless amount of huge snowballs to roll down the slope.

"Well, maybe we can use this Metal Slug Type-R which the RAP Joint Forces left here conveniently." Jenny told the others while putting a hand on the Slug vehicle that is on the same platform the mercenaries are standing on.

Ash jumped right into the Metal Slug Type-R without waiting for the others. "I'm taking the wheels this time, guys!"

Without warning, a single Cannon shell was fired from the Slug, and lands right on top of a Rebel Soldier that's pushing a huge snowball.

"Sorry, guys. That was a misfire..." Ash apologized from within the Metal Slug Type-R.

"Just be careful, Ash." Mina told him.

Ash then backs the Slug vehicle off the platform, landing right on top of another huge snowball, crushing it and the Rebel Soldier pushing it underneath.

"Okay, buddy. You take the lead while we cover your back." Jason said, as he and the girls jumped off the platform behind the Metal Slug Type-R.

The Red Eagles proceeded down the slope, with Ash using the superior jumping capability of the Slug vehicle to jump on top of and crush any snowballs that gets too close to the group.

It didn't take too long before they passed by another platform suspended above the slope. This one is occupied by a Ptolemaic Officer, who proceeds to call in a squadron of Hover Units.

"They're pretty advanced, alright..." Jenny points out about the Ptolemaic Hover Units. "But they can only fire once, and can't take much hit either."

The Red Eagles' combined firepower manages to bring down every Hover Units that comes their way, with Jason's **Sniper Rifle** also instant-killing them via their riders being shot in the head. A few Hover Units does get to release their missiles, only to have those shot out in the first half of a second, and then the Hover units themselves in the second half.

That Officer had a moment of freak out when the last Hover Unit got blown up, and tries to escape. Ash making the Metal Slug Type-R jump high in the air and firing a Cannon shell made short work of the Officer who didn't even get to take a second step. He then lands the Slug vehicle on yet another huge snowball and the Rebel Soldier pushing it.

...

Several shot-in-the-head Hover Units and Masknells of both variants, along with multitudes of crushed snowballs and Rebel Soldiers later, the Red Eagles have finally managed to reach the bottom of the slope, with the Metal Slug Type-R completely unscathed.

"Whew, after all those Hover Units and helicopters, I ended up with an empty **Sniper Rifle** with me..." Jason said as he throws the now-useless weapon away. "Started with 50 bullets, scored exactly that many kills..."

The mercenaries noticed what appears to be a facility entrance just ahead of them. It was of course sealed shut, but doesn't seem that sturdy for what was supposed to separate the RAP Joint Forces' impossible facility from the outside world.

"I could easily blow open that bulkhead with some big bombs." Mina commented about it.

"For a super-secret facility like tis one..." Ash popped out of the Metal Slug Type-R and comments on the situation. "This place got some security, or lack of it thereof..."

It doesn't take the other Red Eagles giving him the look for the chainsaw-totting mercenary to realize that he just tempted fate.

"Oh, shit..." Ash cursed, and berates himself for saying it.

**Boss Battle: _Tani-Oh_**

The massive Tani-Oh tank rolled into action on the stone trail under the metal walkway the Red Eagles are standing on. The massive tank sported the same weapons as it did in the First Morden War - two independently-firing turrets that are each equipped with anti-tank mine launchers and Gatling guns, and a large double-barreled Andro Cannon, with some upgrades added to it, no doubt.

"Shoulda' kept my mouth shut..." Ash berates himself once more.

The Tani-Oh begins its attack by firing its double-barreled Andro Cannons at the Red Eagles. The mercenaries barely manages to avoid getting hit, because that shot was charged up in just a split second, way faster than it was back then.

"Oh, man, that was a close one!" Jason exclaimed.

The independent turrets of the massive tank then begins firing anti-tank mines which lays themselves around the walkway. Back then, these mines would be deflected by shots if they haven't landed on solid floor yet, but in this case, the anti-tank mines not only explodes when shot by the Red Eagles' handguns, but scatter harmful shrapnel around as well.

"Whoa!" Mina exclaims when a piece of shrapnel ricochet off her handgun.

Made even worse by the Gatling guns. The original Tani-Oh's Gatling guns fired tiny explosive rounds that detonates upon touching the higher ground Marco and Tarma are standing on. This version's fired anti-material rounds that went right through the walkway the Red Eagles are standing on, punching several holes in it.

"That is some serious upgrade..." Jenny remarks on how powerful the Tani-Oh has become.

The Red Eagles then peppers the Tani-Oh with all the firepower they have, with Ash occasionally firing a Cannon shell from the Metal Slug Type-R.

The independent turrets appear to have been reinforced too, as one took a lot of bullets, Grenades and Cannon shells before it gets blown off its socket.

Destroying one turret caused the other one to become even more aggressive, as it starts firing anti-tank mines and anti-material rounds non-stop at the direction of the Red Eagles.

"Yikes!" Jason shouted, as he avoids steering himself straight into an anti-tank mine that has been laid right in front of him, and at the same time a sudden Andro Cannon shot almost shearing his face off. "That was a close one! If I was just a millimeter closer to that bulkhead, I might as well rename myself William Birkins!"

"Is it even the right time to mention _Resident Evil_?" Ash hung a lamp on Jason's statement, as he fires the last Cannon shell from the Metal Slug Type-R at Tani-Oh.

That Cannon shell lands right on top of the Andro Cannon, tearing a piece of hull right off the massive tank that it rests on. Although that doesn't weaken Tani-Oh by much.

The massive tank charges up its Andro Cannon once again. Jason, Jenny and Mina jumps out of the way in time (keeping in mind to avoid the aggressively-attacking independent turret at the same time), but Ash in the Metal Slug Type-R wasn't able to evade in time, and took a direct hit. Luckily, one hit from the Andro Cannon is not enough to damage the Slug vehicle to the point of it self-destructing.

"Ow!" The chainsaw-totting mercenary called out, even though he didn't take the hit himself. "Eat lead, you massive hunk of steel!" Ash then unloads the Vulcan on Tani-Oh, while jumping the Slug vehicle around to avoid hitting one of the anti-tank mines.

Eventually, the Tani-Oh took enough damage from Ash's Vulcan spamming (and the other three Red Eagles lobbing Grenades at it) that its next attempt to fire the double-barreled Andro Cannon was interrupted by it blowing up from critical damage. The undestroyed independent turret was launched right out of its socket, and lands on the walkway just a meter in front of the bulkhead door.

_**Tani-Oh**_** defeated.**

"Yeah, that's right! Big guns don't always spell victory!" Ash pops out of the Metal Slug Type-R and quipped.

...

Location: Everest facility command center.

"Damn that President Drippiek again!" Donald Morden cursed out loud when he sees the live footage of the Tani-Oh's defeat at the Red Eagles' hands. "I knew he would cheat again! This time, he left the Regular Commandos at home, and sent these mercenaries to do their dirty jobs for him instead!" He turned around, and sees Amadeus just sitting on top of a metal crate, chilling out as he smokes a cigarette. "And where is that masked occultist called the Ptolemaic Boss, anyway?!"

"Satellites have confirmed that the Ptolemaic Boss appears to be somewhere in Peru..." Amadeus said as he throws the lit cigarette on the floor and extinguishes the flame by stepping on it. "Exactly what he and his followers are doing there are unknown as of yet..."

"In Peru...?" Morden said with surprise in his tone. "Not the first time his cronies have pulled off something out of the world, but what is he planning this time?"

The aforementioned live footage shows Mina Kabuto blowing open the bulkhead door with a satchel of Semtex explosives. The resulting fireball was spectacular (but silent from this room due to the lack of speakers connected to the camera) as the Red Eagles appear to make offhand comments about it while hiding behind one of the independent turrets that detached from Tani-Oh.

"Oh, never mind that!" Morden changed his mind. "Time to play our trump card!"

...

Location: top floor, Everest facility.

The Red Eagles proceeded into the facility that was built right inside the hollowed-out Mount Everest, and finds themselves in a hellishly different world. The corridor right in front of them are populated by Supervisory Cameras that currently aren't able to look straight at them.

"Man, this feels just like one of those places that monsters love to hide in..." Jason comments about the nature of the facility's structure.

Ash popped out of the Metal Slug Type-R again. He wiped sweat off his forehead as he looks around. "Even inside the AC-equipped Slug, I'm still feeling the heat of this place."

Jenny pulled out a Digital Geiger Counter, and scanned the corridor ahead. "There's a small amount of radiation coming from down this corridor. The Counter can't tell what type of radiation it was supposed to be, but at least there's not enough to cause any harm if it were any other kind of radiation..."

"Doesn't matter. Regular Command hired us to demolish this place, and that's exactly what we're gonna do!" Jason proudly boast while posing with his handgun in his hand.

...

Getting through the corridor involved shooting at every Supervisory Cameras and the occasional Patrol Robots that popped out of nowhere, as well as a couple of LV Armors and Ptolemaic mechs (those proved to be quite challenging with just the standard handguns and the Vulcan on the Metal Slug Type-R). It took a while, but the Red Eagles eventually fought their way through it...

...To find themselves standing by a guard rail that separated them from a chasm walled by metal walkways, girders and industrial pipelines that plunges too far down for anyone to see the bottom.

"Now that's one heck of an engineering feat the RAPs have managed to pull off..." Jenny hangs a lamp at the sight.

The sound of a powerful engine passing by drew the attention of the Red Eagles. They looked across the chasm, and sees the Kaladgolg war train passing by on pre-set train tracks that seems to run down the chasm in a spiral pattern around it.

"I have a feeling we'll be fighting that bastard when we reach the bottom..." Ash points out, knowing that there's no point in not tempting anything anymore.

With little warning, a Gatling-equipped Ptolemaic R-Shobu appeared from and hovered over the chasm, obviously pointing its big Gatling gun at the Red Eagles.

The helicopter fires its Gatling gun at the Metal Slug Type-R. Thankfully, the Slug vehicle withstood the volley despite the damage it has taken during the Tani-Oh battle.

Ash proceeds to return the favor by firing the Vulcan at the Ptolemaic Gatling R-Shobu, which turns out to be more fragile than the standard Rebels' variant, as it goes down without being able to fire a second volley.

Something was launched out of the cockpit as the attack helicopter exploded into several pieces, and landed with a thud by the Red Eagles' feet. It was an **Iron Lizard** launcher.

"Funny how we often get weapons that are _just_ perfect for the situations we'll be encountering later..." Jenny hangs yet another lamp as she picks up the **Iron Lizard**.

The Red Eagles leaned over the guard rails and took another peak at the chasm.

"Right, guess we'll be taking the long way down..." Jason comments. "We should complete our mission as soon as possible, it has been dragging on for too long already..."

...

And so the Red Eagles descended down the chasm slowly by taking a nearby staircase down (the Metal Slug Type-R has no problem driving over stairs). Whenever there are enemies at the next floor - be it Rebel Soldiers, LV Armors, Patrol Robots, Amadeus Syndicalists, Morden Robots, Ptolemaic Special Force Troopers, Guerillas, Officers, mechs... Jenny would clear the crowd by sending an **Iron Lizard** or two down the stairs, blowing them all up with what can best be described as a rocket-propelled toy car that smiles.

There were also the occasional bazooka-wielding Paratroopers parachuting down over the chasm and taking potshots at the Red Eagles, as well as the also-occasional R-Shobu (of both Rebel and Ptolemaic, basic and red Elite variants). Those are taken care by Ash firing the Vulcan of the Metal Slug Type-R at them. There was one point where an Elite Ptolemaic R-Shobu flew so close to the stairs that Ash decided to just pop out of the Slug for a second and stab the pilot in the face with his chainsaw.

At the middle portion of the staircase, the Kaladgolg war train passed by from the opposite side of the chasm, and without warning unloaded its Gatling guns all over the staircase. The war train then continues its descend toward the bottom of the chasm.

The Red Eagles, having taken several glancing blows from the unloading just stood there in shock for five seconds.

"If only grazing bullets actually gave us power ups like that one game series..." Mina said.

...

It took a very ling time before the Red Eagles had finally reached the bottom of the staircase. The mercenaries finds themselves on yet another metal walkway no different than the one from the Tani-Oh battle.

"I have no comments on the past thirty minutes for now..." Jason said.

Of course, the Kaladgolg war train got to the bottom of the chasm sooner. It was already parked on the railway under the walkway, waiting for the Red Eagles to arrive.

**Boss battle: _Kaladgolg_**

"I knew it..." Ash quips as he prepares himself for a battle.

Kaladgolg has similar armaments as Tani-Oh: independently-firing Gatling Guns and anti-tank mine launchers, as well as a massive cannon of proportionate scale. Unlike the massive tank, however, the war train's independent turrets are four separate guns (two Gatling guns and two anti-tank mine launchers) which also happens to be completely indestructible. Its massive cannon also mounted a Wave Motion Gun instead of a double-barreled Andro Cannon.

The war train begins its attack by firing both of its Gatling guns at the Metal Slug Type-R. This time, the Slug vehicle finally took enough critical damage that it is going to explode, and Ash ejected just before it did.

"Jeez, this is going to be a tough one." Jenny remarks, as she lobs a Grenade at the Wave Motion Gun which is Kaladgolg's only weak spot.

The Kaladgolg then fires several anti-tank mines all over the walkway. Unlike the ones used by Tani-Oh, these mines do not land on top of the walkway, but instead hovers just a meter off the surface before propelling themselves toward the Red Eagles.

Thankfully, those mines are rather easy to avoid. The mercenaries does so by simply jumping.

"After all those years of fighting them, nobody dared to question how the Rebels are able to build so many of these gargantuan war machines?!" Ash angrily points out about it, while firing at the Kaladgolg.

A weird noise coming from the massive cannon signals that it is about to fire the Wave Motion Gun.

"Oh, sh... Quick, stay back!" Jason called out to the other, and everyone quickly backs themselves against the staircase they came from.

The Kaladgolg fires its Wave Motion Gun, but since the massive cannon can only aim directly upwards, the war train had to move itself to be able to hit anything with it. Luckily for the Red Eagles, they have backed themselves enough that the Kaladgolg can't follow them all the way, resulting in the Wave Motion Gun missing them by a huge margin.

"Let's blow shit up, guys!" Jason shouted hammily, as he and the other Red Eagles lobbed every single Grenades they have at the Kaladgolg.

The volley of Grenades does enough damage that the massive cannon of the war train started flaming all over. But apparently, not enough to completely destroy it.

"Oh, come on..." Ash said disappointingly.

Having taken critical damage, the Kaladgolg's independent guns became even more aggressive, as all four of them starts firing non-stop at the direction of the Red Eagles.

"Just die already!" Mina furiously shouted as she grabs and throw one of her own anti-tank mines at the Kaladgolg, which created a large fireball on contact.

This time, the massive cannon got damaged enough that it simply can't function anymore. A series of chain reaction emerging from the Wave Motion Gun causes the rest of the war train including the indestructible independent guns to break down and fall apart.

_**Kaladgolg**_** defeated.**

The Red Eagles lied down on the walkway, tired.

"About time!" Jenny complains. "This has been dragging on for too long already..."

**MISSION COMPLETE!**

...

Location: Everest facility command center.

"It seems that the president's mercenaries has destroyed your trump card in the place of your intended target..." Amadeus told Morden nonchalantly, as both men watched live footage of the Kaladgolg in shambles.

Morden's response wasn't that he's furious. In fact, he appears to be smiling about it. This surprised Amadeus for real.

"I take it that the Kaladgolg is not your trump card?" The syndicate leader asked.

"No, of course not..." The Devil Rebirth replies. "My trump card is something else, and they too have a bone to personally pick with the Regular Commandos since their defeat at Garbage Island years ago from our perspective..."

Amadeus instantly understood what Morden was talking about. "Do tell me, did they emerge from a circle of light?"

Morden switched off the screen that is playing the live footage, and turned toward Amadeus. "Of course, old man. They are my future..."

The Devil Rebirth suddenly lets out an evil laugh so creepy it sent chills down Amadeus' whole body, despite the environment of the Everest facility being so hot that your sense to heat might as well be permanently numb.

"...Quite literally!"

* * *

**Afterwords**

Welp, a chapter that's longer than the last five I've submitted for this story. Blame my mind for that...

I took parts of this chapter's first half from certain parts of the games. The parachute-platforming scene came from _Metal Slug 7_ in that ruins portion where your character navigate around that ruin with a parachute to help with the descend down it (_Advance_ also have a scene where if your Slug Flyer in the final mission gets shot down, Walter or Tyra will have to parachute down a mid-construction vertical tunnel as an alternate path). The Rebels rolling the huge snowball came from _1_, just before you fight Allen in that game.

Also, the **Sniper Rifle** is a weapon that's only available in the Japan-only _Metal Slug 3D_, and it can't actually headshot anything in that game. That's just an addition on my part.

Oh, and Flynn Taggart is, like Leon Chan, also an OC created by Soldier Of The Future. Thanks, man!

Shout-out index:

"Go! Go! Go! Go! Go!" - You'll be saying that whenever you're being chased by a T-Rex (_Jurassic Park_), or had to hide yourselves from an alien flight controller who had just noticed your hijacking one of their shuttles (_Independence Day_, which is itself a shout-out to _Jurassic_ _Park_).

"If only grazing bullets actually gave us power-ups like that one game series..." - No, Mina, the only game in the world that rewards you for purposefully allowing bullets to graze you is _Touhou_, so don't even think about grazing.

Ironically, the above reference is going to *spoiler alert* become a plot point later...

That is all. "_Dismissed!"_


	7. Chapter 6: Go Deeper

**Forewords**

This story is still very close to the beginning in the sense of how many chapter it will be having. So you will have to wait a very long time before you see the conclusion.

And...there hasn't been another review to this story since I've continued it. Reviews, please...

Back to the storyline, we go!

* * *

**Chapter 6: Go Deeper**

Time: 1930 Hour; 30th of December, 2040.

Location: Somewhere inside the Everest Facility.

_"Attention, all personnel. The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe is currently on its way to the Deployment Hangar in the east face of Mount Everest. Please ensure that the catapult is clear of all obstruction and working properly. All engineers are to report to the Deployment Hangar as soon as possible. All security personnel, you are ordered to remain at your current positions."_

An announcement was broadcast facility-wide just as the Red Eagles are approaching a massive elevator shaft that never finished construction.

"Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe?" Jason took note of the announcement. "Have the RAPs found some Nazi secret technology?"

"No, Jason..." Jenny corrects the red-clad mercenary. "That is the placeholder name for the massive airborne aircraft carrier slash mobile cruise missile launch platform slash flying battleship deployed by the Ptolemaic Army during their last appearance years ago."

"And Regular Command certainly won't allow that thing to take off, buddy..." Ash adds in. "Bastard's armed so well that..."

The chainsaw-totting mercenary was interrupted by Mina. "...It can make even Metal Gear EXCELSUS look like a Lego brick..."

Jason cocked his handgun. "...And that's not even considering the upgrades given to it now."

The Red Eagles looked over the guard rails of the steel walkway they are standing on, down at the very deep industrial-grade elevator shaft.

"Only problem is that this is as far as walking can take us..." Ash told the others. "We're going to have to grapple down this elevator shaft..."

Jenny sighed at hearing the suggestion. "Great, another descend down a very deep chasm, just a few meters from the previous one..."

...

_**Mission Briefing**_

_Looks like that secret facility inside Everest was bigger than we thought. Our latest geological scans shows that part of the facility extends below sea level, and then raises back up to the halfway mark of the mountain. Regular Command was only able to get the full satellite scan when a massive bulkhead opened on the east face of Everest, which in turn compromised its shielding against scans._

_We were also getting more of the Unknown Radiation on our readings. But right now, that is the least of our concerns, or President Drippiek's for that matters. I'm sure you Red Eagles have just heard the facility-wide announcement about something nicknamed The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe. Regular Command have decided that, with the upgrades the massive aircraft is given, we cannot allow it to reach its target, which considering the location of the Deployment Hangar's bulkheads, is very likely to be Beijing, China._

_Forget about Morden and Amadeus for now. It is imperative that The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe does not leave the facility and failing that, be shot down with some of the Slug Flyers that are stolen by the RAPs before it reaches Beijing._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

**MISSION FIVE START!**

With the grapples locked onto the guard rail of the walkway, and the climbing ropes secured to themselves, the Red Eagles began their slow descend down the chasm.

"Be glad with what we have here, guys." Jason told his friends while descending slowly alongside them. "The Regular Commandos have to navigate through a missile silo that's only 20 meters wide when they infiltrated the Amadeus Syndicate Headquarters. We have an elevator shaft that's a hundred times wider."

"But a lot deeper..." Ash mumbles under his breath, as he keeps an eye out for any RAP Joint Forces troops that might appear on the walkways and platforms within the shaft. "Damn. You gotta give credit to whoever designed this facility. Being inside a hollowed-out Everest is one thing. Making it invisible to geological scans is another."

Several Rebel Bazookas pooled themselves onto a metal walkway and started firing their bazookas at the Red Eagles.

The Red Eagles have trouble evading the shots due to the grapples obstructing their movements. Good thing that none of the Rebel Bazookas hit their intended targets. The mercenaries quickly retaliates with their handguns, killing all the Rebels.

"That one was just our luck, guys." Jenny told the others. "Avoiding attacks in these equipment are quite difficult. You either kill the enemies before they attack, or hope that they missed you, so be very careful."

The Red Eagles descended another few meters before encountering a Ptolemaic Bradley that is parked on a broken-off walkway... Which only got to take aim before Mina nonchalantly blows it up with two Grenades.

"Ironically, Ptolemaic Bradleys were easier to deal with than the original Rebel variants, despite the former being an upgrade." Jenny points out about the fact. "Weaker armor, less missile capacity, and actually destructible missiles whatnot..."

The Red Eagles continued their descend down the elevator shaft for several meters without any interruptions.

"An Ammo Box?" Jason said as he points at an Ammo Box that is conveniently left on the edge of a broken off railway that may have been meant for the Caladgolg war train. "You've got to wonder why there's always weapons left in the most unexpected locations..." He proceeds to hang a lamp before approaching and breaking open the box with his Machete.

The Ammo Box contained... something that looked like a flare gun, but was tagged as a **Smart Shot**, and isn't loaded with flares.

"**Smart Shot**? Never seen something like this before..." Ash wondered about the identity of such an odd weapon.

Jason picked up the **Smart Shot** anyway. "Some kind of prototype Regular Army weapon, perhaps? Regular Command seems to be fishy about their technologies lately..."

The Red Eagles are suddenly ambushed by a group of both Rebel and Ptolemaic Paratroopers dropping down from above and peppering them with bazooka shots.

"Oh, goddammit! This thing better be useful!" Jason complained about the ambush as he points the **Smart Shot** at a Rebel Paratrooper, and fires.

Turns out the **Smart Shot** doesn't need to be aimed. Instead, the projectile fired from it left the muzzle slowly, and only for about five centimeters before it erupted into a massive flash that somehow kills off the Paratroopers as though they were hit with **Rocket Launchers** while leaving the Red Eagles themselves unharmed.

The Red Eagles watched with deadpan the dying Paratroopers (whose parachutes were somehow disintegrated by the **Smart Shot**) scream their way toward a falling death below the elevator shaft.

"Jeez, either Miss Germi made this while intoxicated, or Regular Command is smoking something more potent than what they had with the developments of the **Drop Shots**..." Ash hangs a lamp on the ridiculousness of the **Smart Shot**.

"Kasamoto-_san_ is another person you could blame on with the intoxication excuse." Mina joked.

Ash scoffed at the joke. "Yeah, right..."

Continuing their descend down the elevator shaft, the Red Eagles fought their way through Ptolemaic Gunner Units, Iron Isos, Girida-Os, Ptolemaic Bradleys and Melty Honeys that are somehow able to park themselves on the metal walkways, as well as Paratroopers, Airborne Melty Honeys, Hover Units and Fanatic soldiers of all three variants appearing from out of nowhere. All of them were easily dealt with by Jason's **Smart Shot** (although it does take the weapon quite a few uses to bring down a vehicle or mech enemy).

"This is the weirdest, but most useful weapon ever." Jenny comments on the usefulness of the **Smart Shot**.

"Yeah, but it is somewhat useless against armored vehicles, and carried less ammo than a **Super Grenade**, because its empty after just ten shots." Jason adds in before he throws the now empty weapon away.

The Red Eagles only descended a few more meters before their grapple reached their extension limit, stopping them just short of a metal walkway that spanned across the elevator shaft.

"Ah, well..." Jenny quips. "Scanners determined that the bottom of this elevator shaft doesn't lead anywhere else, anyway..."

"So I guess we should walk the rest of the way, right?" Jason asked before he undoes his harness and drops down safely on the walkway.

"I guess so..."

...

Location: Everest Facility command center.

"So, Donald Morden..." Amadeus calmly asked the Devil Rebirth. "What are the next parts of your plan?"

"I will make sure that the so-called Red Eagles go after The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe if they do manage to get to it." Morden said with a straight face, despite facing a blank wall at the moment. "After that, I'll stir up some more troubles in Beijing so as to distract President Drippiek's pawns from what our friend, the Ptolemaic Boss have in mind for them in Peru!"

"And what if they foiled your plans with Beijing?" Amadeus raises a question.

Morden answers with confidence again. "Then I'll let an old friend of mine from Saudi Arabia know that he'll be expected to hit a snag in his latest plans."

"What if the Regulars foiled that too?" Amadeus raised another question.

This time, Morden couldn't give a straight answer. "Th... Then you and I will go AWOL wh... while the Ptolemaic Boss executes the final part of his plans. Fr... From what I've heard about his troops' actions from years ago, even the Regulars considered them to be crazier than they think I am..." The Devil Rebirth said with a bunch of stammering in his sentence.

"Correction, Donald..." Amadeus corrected. "If they do manage to foil your Arab ally, you and I will hide out in my Syndicate's newest headquarters in Kamchatka..."

Morden took note of the location mentioned by the Syndicate leader. "Russia? Just what plans do you have with that place?"

...

Location: Somewhere inside the Everest Facility.

The metal walkway had led the Red Eagles into a scaffolding laid against the walls of a fully functioning elevator shaft wide enough that The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe can fit in it. The aforementioned massive aircraft is currently being transported on a platform which then stops it descend down the shaft before going through a bulkhead that opened on the opposite end of the shaft.

"So that's the Ptolemaic's ace of the skies..." Jason comments about the massive aircraft. "Makes you wonder how they build it in the first place..."

"Only question now is..." Ash pointed a finger at the bulkhead that the Secret Weapon was sent through, which has just sealed shut. "How do we get to it now?"

"It's a pretty long way down, and I don't see any elevators or stairs we could walk on..." Jenny told the others while looking around the shaft.

The scaffolding didn't have anyone or anything else on it, aside from the Red Eagles... and a Supervisory Camera that is missing its gun.

Mina went and poked that gun-less Supervisory Camera with the tip of her katana. "Why do you suppose they put a lone security camera over something not worth guarding?" The purple-clad Japanese mercenary girl asked with curiosity.

The gun-less Supervisory Camera seems to react, and "stared" straight at Mina. This surprised all four Red Eagles, causing them to each take a step back and point their guns at the camera.

The camera remained "staring" at the Red Eagles for about five seconds, before it turned lower toward the ground, and...

"Is that camera... projecting a 3D hologram?" Jenny points out about the strange thing happening right now.

The hologram is of what appears to be a decorated Rebel commander.

_"So you are the mercenaries that The Government has sent to do their dirty work for..."_ The Rebel commander's holographic projection spoke to the mercenaries calmly. _"I am Colonel Gyllendal, and I, like Allen O'Neil, answer to General Donald Morden..."_

Ash purposely interrupts the non-physical conversation. "Yeah, yeah. I know what you are going to say, blah, blah. And I also know you're not an answering machine, judging by how you greeted us..." The grey-haired mercenary even swings his bloodied chainsaw at the hologram in a mocking manner.

The Rebel commander, Colonel Gyllendal, is rather unpleased with being mocked, but he kept calm, and continued with his speech. _"Mocking me won't get you anywhere, just like how Marco Rossi and his friends mocked the General all the time. Oh, and the General also wanted me to forward this message to you..."_ Gyllendal's hologram pointed a finger behind him...

...Just in time for a large mechanical contraption of some kind, which sported a quad-barreled rotary cannon on its upper half, and a trap door of some kind on the lower half.

_"...The General would like you to be the test subjects for his newest ally - the Ptolemaic Army's upgraded version of their tower-scaling machine. Until then..."_ The Rebel commander's hologram then simply dissipates, just before one of the mechanical toes of the wall-crawling monstrosity knocks the projecting camera right off its sockets.

The Red Eagles turned toward each other with deadpan.

"Sheesh. Some calm demeanor that guy has, being Morden's other right hand man..." Jenny figuratively hangs a lamp on Gyllendal's character.

"None of this would be happening right now if Regular Command had not sent Morden's son on that anti-terror mission with insufficient intel..." Jason adds in.

The mercenaries turned back toward the wall-crawling monstrosity.

**Boss battle: _Wall Crawler_**

"Let's do this!"

...

The Wall Crawler starts off by firing several larger-than-necessary cannon shells at the Red Eagles with its rotary cannon. The shells not only were fired faster but travelled faster than the ones fired by the original Wall Crawler, but did not give the Red Eagles much difficulty in avoiding being hit.

"Don't be so grateful yet, guys. This thing's definitely have more upgrades than faster shots." Jason told his friends as he fires at the Wall Crawler with his handgun.

After firing a few cannon shells, the Wall Crawler climbed two floors down the scaffolding, in which the hatch on top opens, and the controller of the monstrosity comes out to call in reinforcements.

But, while the original Wall Crawler's controller called in two Bazooka Guerillas on the floor below, this one called in a Gatling R-Shobu that pops out from behind it.

"This one's not really an upgrade, just a change of tactics." Jenny points out, as she blows up the Gatling R-Shobu with two Grenades.

As soon as the Gatling R-Shobu is destroyed, the controller went back down and sealed the hatch, and the Wall Crawler climbed two floors up so that its rotary cannons are on the same elevation as the Red Eagles.

"Guys, I think this is the part where the damn thing fires a Sonic Cannon that causes the floor we're standing on to crumble..." Ash warns his friends...

...Just as an odd pitch of noise erupted from the floor below that caused the ground of the current floor to wobble so much that it starts cracking.

"Then jump!" Jason yells out, and everyone jumped just as the wobbling floor somehow _explodes_ and disintegrates, causing the Red Eagles to land on the lower floor.

"Ow. That's why I hate fighting hulking machines without any Slug vehicles..." Jenny complains as she tries to stand up.

The Wall Crawler descended one floor, and fired its rotary cannons a second time at the Red Eagles a second time.

The Red Eagles easily evades the large shells, but Mina failed to completely jump over a shell that was fired at ground level, which caused her to trip over and face-plants the floor.

"I'm okay!" The purple-clad Japanese girl calls out to her friends as she gets up. "But, that thing is not going to be..."

That said, Mina chucked several Grenades in succession at the Wall Crawler just before it climbs two floor down, and the controller calls in another Gatling R-Shobu.

This time, the Gatling R-Shobu only manages to fire shots that only hit the floor before the Red Eagles' combined firepower blows it up. The explosion somehow threw a **Heavy Machine Gun** toward the mercenaries, which Jenny snatches from the air.

"Sometimes you also have to wonder why enemy vehicles often carry infantry weapons that we can use. But that can be answered later..." Ash hangs a lamp on the phenomenon.

The Wall Crawler continues with its attack by climbing up. But rather than two floors to point its rotary cannons straight at the Red Eagles, it climbed just one floor so that the rotary cannons are aimed at the floor below.

"Now what will its next upgrade be?" Jenny wonders while being careful about it.

The Wall Crawler fires its rotary cannons in a different mode while it is aimed at the floor below. The original one fired a large number of unguided and random missiles in this mode, but this upgraded version seems to fire landmine-shaped objects that upon landing on the floor, fired a straight beam of laser that ripped right through the floor the Red Eagles are standing on.

"Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! This is not what anyone of us have in mind!" Jason exclaims loudly while he and his friends tries their best at avoiding the laser beams.

After the Wall Crawler is done laying down the laser-spewing landmines, it climbed one floor up, preparing to fire its Sonic Cannon again.

"Payback time, bitch!"

Jason and Ash pounded on the rotary cannons of the Wall Crawler with their melee weapons rapidly (with Jason using his machete in conjunction with Vulcan Chop) while Jenny and Mina fired at the mechanical monstrosity with their **Heavy Machine Gun **and handgun respectively.

BOOM! The Wall Crawler sustained enough damage that it blew up as soon as it fires the Sonic Cannon.

The Red Eagles jumped one last time to avoid the explosion that erupts from the floor they're standing on because of the Wall Crawler's last hurrah Sonic Cannon attack. The mercenaries lands safely on the lower floor just in time to see the Wall Crawler slowly sliding down the scaffolding while in shambles.

The controller of the monstrosity popped the hatch open, and said to the Red Eagles "Damn you!" before he jumped off the Wall Crawler and into the elevator shaft with a parachute.

_**Wall Crawler **_**defeated.**

"Well, we've defeated this monstrosity. So what now?" Ash asked the others for opinions.

"According to Regular Command's geological scans, this particular elevator shaft isn't very deep. In fact, we can see the bottom clearly from this height." Jenny analyzed the next part of the mission. "The same scans indicated that there's a maintenance shaft at the bottom of this elevator shaft that leads straight to the hangar in the east face of Everest. If we hurry up, we might just be able to catch up with the Secret Weapon..."

...

Location: East Hangar, Everest Facility.

After spending several minutes getting to the bottom of the elevator shaft and crawling through the aforementioned maintenance shaft, the Red Eagles find themselves emerging inside a very large hangar, with the bulkhead leading outside already opened.

The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe is also there, currently being prepped for deployment by several Ptolemaic Engineers (strangely enough, not a single Rebel Soldier or Amadeus Syndicalist can be seen in the hangar).

"I'm guessing that's what we're supposed to destroy." Jason points out. "Hard to see why, if Regular Command would rather lose track of Morden than to let that thing loose."

"Come on, like Mina said, even Metal Gear EXCELSUS looked like a Lego brick when compared to that thing!" Ash reminded everyone.

The Red Eagles are seen by a passing-by Rebel Soldier, who quickly ran off in panic. The mercenaries quickly noticed that, unlike the usual Rebel Soldiers, this one is dressed in bright blue fatigues along with a helmet that seems to have two Tesla coils on it.

"Wait a minute..." Jenny became suspicious about the oddity of that Rebel Soldier. "That Rebel Soldier is not a normal one..."

"They seemed so familiar, yet I can't recall any information about them from Regular Command's databases." Mina wonders.

Before they can get their confusion answered, the Red Eagles were quickly approached by a mob of Ptolemaic Special Force Troopers.

"Ah, never mind. Priorities first..." Jason deadpanned as he aims and fires his handguns at the Special Force Troopers.

The other Red Eagles followed suit by firing at the mob of enemies. Jenny's **Heavy Machine Gun** mowed them down very quickly, but because there were simply so many of them, the **Heavy Machine Gun** ran out of ammo after the last Special Force Trooper is pumped full of lead.

"There's always the handgun and other weapons we can use." The blue-haired female mercenary said as she tosses the empty gun away.

The Red Eagles moved on, and soon encountered a Ptolemaic Officer, who simply called in two Ptolemaic Slugs (one coming from behind him, the other driving onto the walkway above) before having a freak-out moment and running away.

The Ptolemaic Slug directly in front of the Red Eagles wasn't very smart, as it tries to jump up and fire its cannon in midair, which the mercenaries can avoid by simply standing next to the AI-controlled tank. Ash easily destroys it by hacking it into pieces with his chainsaw.

The Ptolemaic Slug on the walkway above, while is a bit smarter with its tactic of sniping the Red Eagles with its Vulcan gun, takes far too long with its aiming. By the time it fires a bullet, the Red Eagles have already shot it out of commission with their handguns.

"Humans were smarter than those things..." Jenny lampshades the stupidity of the Ptolemaic Slug AI.

The Red Eagles moved on in an effort to get to The Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe before it takes off. Though it wasn't very long before they encountered another Rebel Soldier...

...Who literally popped out from thin air.

"What the?!" Jason was surprised at this.

The strange bright blue-clad Rebel Soldier lunged at Mina like a Fanatic soldier, but one difference is that he was using an electric glove-assisted Karate chop instead of the usual combat knife.

Mina only manages to save herself by beheading the Rebel Soldier with her katana.

"Now I remember!" The Japanese female mercenary exclaimed. "This guy is from a futuristic version of the Rebel Army!"

"Future...? You don't mean... the Future Rebel Army?!" It was Jenny's turn to exclaim.

"Correct! The Future Rebel Army, the same bunch that came to Morden's assistance back in the Garbage Island Standoff." Mina gives out the full details of what she knew.

Within seconds, more Future Rebel Soldiers materialized out of thin air, and all of them deployed bouncing bombs from their futuristic backpack.

"But thankfully, they aren't as hard to take out as their present day counterparts." Mina added as she slides under a bouncing bomb, and kills a Future Rebel Soldier with a headshot.

The other Red Eagles said nothing more, as they jump over the volley of bouncing bombs and takes out the Future Rebel Soldiers.

"So I'm guessing that Morden and his new friends must've found a way to reactivate the Time Portal..." Ash voiced his own opinion on the matter. "Should have expected that when the reports stated that the Time Portal disappeared on the Regular Commando's second visit to Garbage Island."

All of a sudden, a klaxon sounded loudly in the hangar, drawing the Red Eagles' attention on to The Secret Weapon.

_"Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe prepped and ready for take off in one minute. All non-essential personnel are to vacate the hangar immediately. Security personnel are to at least delay the intruders while the aircraft is leaving the hangar."_ An announcement was made in the hangar, which is followed by the Secret Weapon starting up its massive rocket thrusters.

"Oh, shoot. That thing's about to get away!" Jason exclaims.

"Good thing the RAPs have conveniently left some Slug Flyers behind." Jenny said and points ahead of her, directly at four Slug Flyers that are several meters ahead.

"I guess an aerial dogfight with that behemoth is unavoidable now..." Ash deadpans about the turn of the situation.

The Red Eagles quickly headed for the parked Slug Flyers. Halfway through their rushing, several Future Bazooka Soldiers on jetpacks teleported out of nowhere, and started firing their laser cannons at the mercenaries.

Despite probably having more advanced aiming mechanisms, the Future Bazooka Soldiers still managed to not hit their intended targets.

"Get lost! We've got no time with you guys!" Jenny shouted at the enemies before shooting them all down with her handgun.

After the Future Bazooka Soldiers have been taken out, a Future Masknell teleported in and fired suppressive shots at the Red Eagles.

"Damn! This is something even the _Metal Gear_ cast wouldn't be facing in their missions: Time-travelling armies!"

The Red Eagles tries their best at dodging the suppressive fire. When they successfully did so, they combined their firepower and shot down the Future Masknell before it can get ready for a second round of fire.

"Come on, the Secret Weapon is about to leave the hangar!" Jenny called out to her friends. "Let's go after it and shoot it down with the Slug Flyers before it reaches Beijing!"

As the Red Eagles approaches the parked Slug Flyers, the loud noise of the Secret Weapon taking off and leaving the hangar masked the sound of an ambush of Future Bazooka Soldiers and Future Shield Soldiers teleporting in from behind them. At this point, getting into the Slug Flyers was actually faster than turning around and shoot the ambushing soldiers, and the Red Eagles chose the former, getting inside the Slug Flyers and going after the Secret Weapon which has just left the hangar, while hoping that the Future Bazooka Soldiers don't land any shots on them.

...

Location: Stratosphere layer, somewhere above the India/China border.

"Whew, that was a close one..." Jason sighed in relief after having just barely escaped an ambush by the Future Rebel Army.

"But now we got a giant, flying Metal Gear-esque aircraft to take care of..." Jenny reminds everyone present.

"But where could it have gone to?" Ash said as he looked around the sky while inside the cockpit of his Slug Flyer.

It was Mina who had located the massive aircraft in question. "There!"

The Secret Weapon's familiar camo-green can be seen streaking past about a kilometer to the left of the Red Eagles. It dived below the clouds and disappeared...

...Only to suddenly reappear directly behind the Red Eagles' Slug Flyers.

**Boss Battle: _Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe_**

"Everyone, evasive maneuvers!" Jenny called out to everyone right as the Secret Weapon aims and fires both of its double-barreled full-auto Electro-Cannons.

This version's Electro-Cannons weren't much different than the original Secret Weapon's, except for the fact that this upgraded version uses its forward facing flak layers at the same time. The Red Eagles soon finds themselves peppered by a cloud of flaks after evading the volley of Electro-Cannon shells. Luckily their Slug Flyers did not sustain much damage from the cloud of flaks.

"Man, I thought we were goners..." Ash exclaims softly about the situation from earlier.

The Secret Weapon dived below the clouds once again, and reappears in front of the Red Eagles. The massive aircraft proceeds to release a barrage of napalm bombs that flew all over the place. The bombs can be shot out, but there were simply too many of them, and the Red Eagles were trying their best to shoot down as many as they can while avoiding the ones they didn't shoot.

After it is done releasing its barrage of napalm bombs, the Secret Weapon topped it off by firing an unguided cruise missile that only travelled a few meters behind before erupting in a massive explosion that can best be described as a scaled-down nuke.

The Red Eagles only manages to avoid getting vaporized by flying their Slug Flyer closer to the Secret Weapon.

"Holy shit! Now imagine if this thing reaches Beijing!" Jason exclaims loudly about the massive aircraft's latest weapon.

"It will be able to reduce the capital to rubble several hundred times, and still have enough payload to do the same to other world capitals!" Mina points out a horrific possibility.

"We may be mercenaries, but we go for what is the right thing to do!" Jason announces to his friends his intentions.

The Secret Weapon tries to use its massive rocket thrusters as giant flamethrowers to incinerate the Red Eagles. Luckily for the four mercenaries, this attack is rather easy to avoid. The massive aircraft sped off and disappeared into a layer of cloud once again.

When the Secret Weapon reappears behind the Red Eagles, it is suddenly accompanied by two Ptolemaic Eaca-Bs, which proceeds to launch their missiles at the mercenaries.

"Why am I not surprised by this?" Jason said with sarcasm as he evades a missile and shoots down the Ptolemaic Eaca-B that fired it. The fighter jet bursted into flames before crashing into the Secret Weapon.

"The original Secret Weapon carried fighters in its cargo bay. I wouldn't be surprised that this upgraded version actually uses its fighters for assistance." Jenny points out as she blows up a Ptolemaic Eaca-B with a missile from her Slug Flyer.

The Secret Weapon tries its Electro-Cannons and flak layers combo again. This time, the Red Eagles knew what to expect, and carefully navigated around the volley of projectiles. One of the flaks had spawned a crack on the windshield of Ash's Slug Flyer.

"Oh well. At least its not such a big deal... yet." The chainsaw-totting mercenary deadpanned.

The Secret Weapon dived below the clouds once again, and reappears in front of the Red Eagles, where it releases a barrage of napalm bombs once again.

"Not this one again!"

Due to the sheer unpredictability of the movements of the napalm bombs, the Red Eagles got into the exact same situation as the last time they faced this attack. This time, all four Slug Flyers came out of it in critical condition.

"I don't think either of us could take another hit..." Jenny hated to point out the obvious, but that's the only thing that can be pointed out at this moment.

The Secret Weapon fires yet another cruise missile at the Red Eagles.

"Don't even think about it, _baka_!" Mina shouted out as she focuses the firepower of her Slug Flyer on the cruise missile.

The cruise missile blew up before it can close in to the Red Eagles. The massive explosion also took out the rear rotor fan of the Secret Weapon, leaving its backside greatly damaged.

"Good one, Mina!" Ash congratulates the Japanese girl for what she did.

The Secret Weapon counterattacks with its rocket thrusters, which is once again easily evaded by the mercenaries. After doing so, it sped off and disappears into the clouds once again, before reappearing behind the Red Eagles, accompanied by two more Ptolemaic Eaca-Bs.

"This is dragging on for too long. I say we blow this piece of junk up!"

Deciding on their strategy against the Secret Weapon, the Red Eagles quickly shot down the Ptolemaic Eaca-Bs, and fired all the missiles they have left at the cockpits of the massive aircraft.

The volley of Slug Flyer missiles destroys the cockpit of the Secret Weapon, which set off a chain reaction that causes the rest of the massive aircraft to burst into flames. The damage it has sustained in total crippled it to the point that it can't stay airborne any longer.

"Yeah! We did it!" Jason yells out in excitement. "We've saved Beijing from the wrath of the RAP Joint Forces!"

As the smoking remains of the Secret Weapon descends below the clouds, the Red Eagles noticed that a jet of unknown model emerged from its cargo bay. The unknown jet sped off before anyone of the Red Eagles can fire at it.

"Well, no doubt that Morden and Amadeus are in that jet." Ash stated in disappointment. "Which means that they got away, again..."

_**Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe**_** defeated.**

"Don't worry, Ash. It seems that fate has just gave us another chance at taking out those two madmen." Jenny told the chainsaw-totting mercenary. "Regular Command has just called us. They want us to head for Beijing right away. Seems that the Everest Facility is just another ploy to draw attention away from us, as Regular Command has just detected activity in the Chinese capital and the rural region outside of it..."

"Another ploy?! Goddammit!" Ash cursed out loud from inside his Slug Flyer, prompting a bit of chuckle from Jason, Jenny and Mina.

* * *

**Afterwords**

This chapter took me two weeks to finish, because I have to think of the upgrades that fitted the Wall Crawler and Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe quite well. Sorry for the delay.

So the Future Rebel Army are now part of the RAP Joint Forces? This is starting to get more interesting...

Some details to note about the Secret Weapon: 1)That's the Mission 2 boss of _Metal Slug 5_, which has no official name as of the writing of this chapter. "Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe" is just a placeholder name the entire fandom gave to it, though some, I believe called it "Ptolemaic Air Force". 2)Promotional art of _Metal Slug 5_ revealed that the Secret Weapon is capable of deploying fighter jets from its rear cargo bay. It doesn't do that in-game, so my upgrade to the thing have it does precisely this. 3)There is no such thing as a Ptolemaic Eaca-B in the games. The Ptoles have their own Flying Tara variant, but not an Eaca-B.

As for the **Smart Shot**, it is actually the **SS** weapon box from _Metal Slug: First Mission_ that was never even mentioned in the Metal Slug Wiki. One Let's Player had called it "Super Soaker", but to me, the **SS** may have stood for something else.

Finally, Colonel Gyllendal is an OC made by MadSoldiersProduction, just like the Red Eagles Squad. Thanks, man!

Shout-out index:

**Go Deeper** \- "We need to go deeper..." ~Tagline of _Inception_.

"...Metal Gear EXCELSUS..." - Proves that you need more than Optical Camouflage and a Cardboard Box to make down mobile nuclear missile launch stations, especially if the station in question is an aircraft instead of a walking bipedal tank.

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	8. Chapter 7: All-You-Cannot-Eat Lead

**Forewords**

Well, I've got nothing to talk about in this Forewords section.

Feels just like the old days when I was able to update _Fantasy Blitzkrieg_ once every day.

Ah, nostalgia...

* * *

**Chapter 7: All-You-Cannot-Eat Lead**

Time: 0300 Hour; 31st of December, 2040.

Location: Chinese Wilderness; Approximately 5 Kilometers from Beijing, China.

Trying their best not to get detected by RAP Joint Force troops, the Red Eagles landed their Slug Flyers deep within a mountainside forest.

"Let's leave the Slug Flyers here. The RAPs probably have anti-air defenses set up in the capital." Jenny suggested to her friends.

After doing so and getting out of their Slug Flyers, the Red Eagles proceed to cover up the aircrafts with the surrounding vegetation.

"You know, guys, I felt kind of pissed that we were going to spend New Year's Eve and by extension New Year's Day away on a mission..." Ash points out about the fact.

"Well, what choice do we have, buddy?" Jason tells the chainsaw-totting mercenary. "We either save the world first and celebrate a holiday later, or the other way around. Personally, I'd rather save the world first."

Just as Jason finishes his sentence, he and his friends were forced to duck below the flora to avoid being spotted by a passing-by RAP patrol, which consisted of several Rebel Soldiers, Amadeus Syndicalist, Ptolemaic Guerillas, and of particular note: both Emain Macha tanks.

The Red Eagles emerged from their cover after the patrols have passed by.

"Are those two massive tanks the Emain Macha twins?" Mina took note of the build of the massive twin tanks.

"Yes, and no doubt that these two are more advanced than the versions that Walter and Tyra encountered during their training days." Jenny responds to the Japanese girl.

...

**_Mission Briefing_**

_Good work on destroying the Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe, Red Eagles. Although Morden and Amadeus got away again, we have thrown a massive wrench into the RAP Joint Force's plans._

_Your next objective is as follows: find your way into downtown Beijing, and eradicate as many RAP Joint Force troops as you can. HQ has also learned from satellite surveillance that the enemy has apparently built a new version of the massive land battleship called Big Shiee. However, the Big Shiee had somehow disappeared from our radars just a few minutes later, and its last known location was at Tiananmen Square._

_After you are done with the RAP troops, attempt to locate Big Shiee and then destroy it with all the firepower you have available. Use the Slug Gunner that is located somewhere near your landing spot if necessary. When you have successfully dealt with Big Shiee, we will be able to mobilize our own troops to clear out any remaining enemies._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

**MISSION SIX START!**

The first thing the Red Eagles encountered on their trek was an Ammo Box. Upon being broken open, the Ammo Box revealed a **Zantetsu Sword**.

"A **Zantetsu Sword**? Not very useful, in my opinion..." Jason comments on the weapon. "I still prefer my Machete."

"And I still prefer my Chainsaw." Ash adds into the comment.

A Ptolemaic Girida-O suddenly appears behind the Red Eagles and fired a volley of shells at them.

Mina was the first to notice the surprise attack. "Look out!" She quickly grabbed the **Zantetsu Sword** and swung it at the shells which somehow slices them in half without detonating them. Mina then uses the **Zantetsu Sword** to slice the cannon off the Ptolemaic Girida-O, which effectively destroys it.

All the other Red Eagles stared straight at the **Zantetsu Sword** for a few seconds.

"On the other hand, this weapons does something that no other can." Jenny remarks. "We should keep it just in case."

The Red Eagles continued with their trek. It wasn't very long until they came across a Ptolemaic Slug that is backed by a Ptolemaic Di-Cokka.

"Mina, you know what to do!" Jason called out.

Mina with the **Zantetsu Sword** made short work of the Ptolemaic Slug by slicing it in half. The resulting razor wind from the slice was also somehow able to intercept all three shells that the Ptolemaic Di-Cokka soon fires. She proceeds to finish off the Ptolemaic Di-Cokka with a second slice.

"Man, if this is a video game, this weapon is prime candidate for some nerfing..." Ash points out as he realizes how useful the **Zantetsu Sword** can be.

"A nerf that we specifically don't want." Mina speaks back.

The Red Eagles went on with their objective. Minutes went on without them encountering anything else, until one point where they are forced to hide inside bushes to stay out of sight of the Emain Macha twin tanks which somehow stopped in their tracks alongside a group of Amadeus Syndicalist and Morden Robots.

"What could they be doing here?" Jason whispered to his friends.

"I dunno. Maintenance, maybe?" Jenny whispered back. "Regular Command's reports did say that the original twins have very clunky engines and weapons."

The green Emain Macha tank suddenly fires an incendiary shell at one of the Morden Robots, which triggers the self-destruct in its bazooka (which bloats up in a cartoonish way before exploding), with the small explosion disintegrating the skin and exposing its robotic skeleton.

A Ptolemaic Engineer came out from behind the green tank and tells the Amadeus Syndicalist "Clear!" with a thumb-up.

As the same Morden Robot begins to walk away from the group with a zombie-like gait, the red Emain Macha tank finishes it off with what appears to be a _White Phosphorous shell_. Said Morden Robot was practically wiped from existence by that White Phosphorous fireball, which left a mid-sized crater and several small batches of flames in said crater.

The Amadeus Syndicalist and Ptolemaic Engineers laughed at the destroyed Morden Robot, until they notices that the Emain Macha twin tanks and intact Morden Robots have took off without them, in which case they hastily follows them.

The Red Eagles waited for the enemy forces to move out of sight before emerging from hiding.

"That... was some serious upgrade in terms of firepower..." Ash makes a soft exclamation at what was demonstrated by the Emain Macha twin tanks.

Mina was at a complete loss of words.

...

The Red Eagles went on with their mission after making sure that the Emain Macha twin tanks have left the vicinity. Again, it wasn't very long until they came across another enemy party. This time, a 3-Ton Utility Truck that is somehow able to fit a Future Girida-O inside. The future mini-tank drove out of the back of the 3-Ton Utility Truck which then drives away from he scene without doing anything else.

"Sometimes you just have to wonder why these transport vehicles can carry a lot more than their size suggest..." Jason hangs a lamp about the occurrence.

A second 3-Ton Utility Truck then appears from behind the Red Eagles. This one is also carrying a Future Girida-O, and it too drove away without doing anything else.

"Okay, that lamp can be hung later..." Jenny deadpans about the current situation.

The Red Eagles had to rely on Mina to deflect the plasma balls with her **Zantetsu Sword**, due to how accurate both Future Girida-O's were with their shots. Moreover, the Future Girida-O's proved to be quite resistant to the **Zantetsu Sword** when Mina attempted to slice them in half with it.

"Just what are these things made of?!" Ash calls out furiously as he tries to use his Chainsaw on one Future Girida-O. He has been cutting into said future mini-tank for an _entire minute and it only scraped the paint off_.

By the time the two Future Girida-O's were destroyed, the **Zantetsu Sword** had already broken off, making it completely useless from that point.

"Oh well, guess we'll have to be lucky at dodging what the Future Rebels throw at us..." Mina said as she throws the broken sword away.

It wasn't a very long walk before the Red Eagles encountered yet another enemy party. A group of Amadeus Syndicalist in this case.

Because the Syndicalist were standing so close together, it took just a single Grenade from Mina to blow them all up.

"Sayonara, baka!" The Japanese girl called out with satisfaction.

"Wow, I'm glad that Eri Kasamoto is more explosive-happy than Mina is..." Ash makes an offhand comment about the kill.

...

The Red Eagles entered what appeared to be a clearing in the forest that is void of enemy forces. They immediately become suspicious about it.

"Since we mercenaries have been so used to raising figurative flags, I think its safe to assume this is where a sort of boss battle is about to begin..." Jason remarks about it.

Sure enough, Jason's suspicion is confirmed by a large bush being shaken off nearby, revealing the green tank of the Emain Macha twin tanks.

**Boss battle: _Emain Macha._**

"As I was going to say..." The lead mercenary tries not to deadpan about it, as he slowly raises his pistol up. "BATTLESTATIONS!"

The green tank starts off by rapid-firing several incendiary shells at the general direction of the Red Eagles. The shells detonated around the mercenaries, trapping them inside a ring of fire.

"I guess that's why I never liked warm welcomes." Jason finally deadpans about the situation.

That said, the Red Eagles proceed to focus their firepower on the cannon of the upgraded green tank, much like how Walter and Tyra dealt with the original. Unlike the original, this upgraded version fires its three shells in a spread-out pattern rather than landing all three on a single spot, it also has a Ptolemaic Bazooka Guerilla instead of a Rebel Bazooka Soldier serving as backup gunner.

"Will you guys just give up?!" Ash yells out as he takes out the Bazooka Guerilla with his handgun.

The Red Eagles continued firing on the cannon of the green tank while evading the incendiary shells it fires all over the place. The mercenaries suffered many close shaves with the fire pits left by the shells in their wake, but thankfully, the fires don't burn long enough to completely limit their movements.

It took several hundred bullets to take out the green tank's cannon, which caused a chain reaction that proceeds to blow the whole vehicle to pieces.

"Okay, that was tough." Jenny points out, but did not relax just yet. "We still have the red one to deal with."

Yet another large bush has been shaken off to reveal the red tank of the Emain Macha twins. This one has a Future Bazooka Soldier as the backup gunner.

"Careful, guys! The big brother is here!" Jason calls out to the others.

The red tank nonchalantly fires three White Phosphorous shells at the direction of the Red Eagles.

The mercenaries were lucky enough to jump out of the way of the large explosion by a mere inch.

"The Pyro will be proud of the pyrotechnics..." It was Ash who makes the offhand comment.

After the fires caused by the White Phosphorous have burned out, the Red Eagles moved in to shoot at the cannon of the red tank (after taking out the Future Bazooka Soldier).

The red tank fires another burst of three White Phosphorous shells at the Red Eagles. Jenny was almost caught in the explosion caused by the third shell, and had just barely escaped from it.

"That's it! I've had enough of using only the handgun!" Jenny said furiously. She proceeds to take something from her bag and sets it down on the ground. Said object quickly unfolds into what appears to be a full-sized Walking Machine, complete with a Vulcan, which she jumps on and rides. "Now this is what I'm talking about!"

The cyan-haired female mercenary proceeds to use the Walking Machine's Vulcan to shoot up the cannon of the red tank. With such an unexpected firepower, the cannon was shot up to the point of destruction right as it was about to fire another White Phosphorous shell. The cannon exploded with a large fireball that had set the newly-emerging Future Bazooka Soldier on fire, and then with a chain reaction that completely wrecks the rest of the red tank.

**_Emain Macha_ defeated.**

"You just have to bring one of those 'instant' Walking Machines with you in every mission. Eh, Jenny?" Jason said to Jenny.

The cyan-haired female mercenary dismounted the Walking Machine before responding, "You never know what you'll be coming against, after all."

"So, guys..." Ash decides to cut in. "We've dealt with the Emain Macha twins in the forest, but Regular Command told us that we should deal with the Big Shiee in the city..."

"Big Shiee?!" Mina exclaims at that name. "That land battleship is going to be a lot harder to beat..."

...

Location: Somewhere in Beijing, China.

Two Rebel Soldiers can be seen just standing in the middle of the road, playing Rock, Paper, Scissors with each other while being oblivious to what their comrades were doing elsewhere in the Chinese capital.

That also made them oblivious to an approaching Ptolemaic Landseek, which proceeds to run one over and knock the other several feet away from where he stood.

It is then revealed that the Red Eagles were behind the wheel of that Ptolemaic Landseek, after having somehow hijacked it back in the forest.

"I still prefer our Landseek, which admittedly was left behind in Regular Command after we drove it back from San Francisco..." Jason voices his opinion.

All of a sudden, the Red Eagles are greeted by increasingly stronger localized tremors that is accompanied by the also increasingly louder noise of a massive engine originating from a nearby street. Through the space in between the skyscrapers, the Red Eagles are able to see what is causing the localized tremor and loud noise: the land battleship, Big Shiee.

Big Shiee passed by the Red Eagles without even pointing one of its guns at them. This may be because the mercenaries were standing in the land battleship's blind spot.

"Wow, that thing is so loud and huge that I'm surprised Regular Command actually managed to lose track of it." Jenny hangs a lamp on how the titanic construct had managed to evade detection by the Regular Army so far.

"Well, we're gonna be fighting that big guy sooner or later. I don't think it would've mattered whether Regular Command can detect it or not..." Ash voices his own opinion on the matter.

...

The first thing that tries to attack the Red Eagles in the city is two MV-280B combat jeeps; one up front and one from behind.

"Really? I thought they'll be sending increasingly stronger units after us..." Jason makes a sort-of complain before he completely wrecks the one in front with his Vulcan Chop attack.

"I thought so too..." Ash added in as he wrecks the other MV-280B by cutting into its hood using his Chainsaw.

The first MV-280B had somehow dropped a **Rocket Launcher **after being destroyed; the second dropped a **Shotgun**.

"Pretty sure we'll be needing those weapons, so we might as well pick them up now." Jenny suggested to the others regarding the weapons.

The Red Eagles weren't able to make their decision first before a party of Amadeus Syndicalist suddenly dropped down from above them via fast-rope descend.

"We're going to need those weapons fast!" As she was in a hurry, Mina went and picked up the **Rocket Launcher** without waiting for anyone first.

"Wait up!" The other Red Eagles called out at once. Jason went and picked up the **Shotgun** to join the fight.

The first Amadeus Syndicalist to step on the ground is swiftly blown to bits by Jason's **Shotgun**. The next one who decided to let go of the descend rope early and lunge at him with his knife drawn was very soon greeted by Jenny's Taser straight to the face. Another Syndicalist decides that he is better off just sliding down the rope, but promptly gets sliced vertically in half by Mina's Katana as he was landing.

What's funny about this entire sequence is that Ash is just standing under one of the descend ropes, yawning while one Amadeus Syndicalist after another slides straight into the blades of his active Chainsaw; piles of half-corpses were just stacking up next to his feet until there were no more enemies fast-roping down.

A lone Dararin Dara Dara drove slowly into the scene on a skyscraper's service scaffold that is directly above the Red Eagles. Mina proceeds to destroy the modified tank and its cargo with two shots from her **Rocket Launcher**.

"Baka..." The Japanese girl mocked in her native language.

...

Location: Downtown Beijing, China.

As Big Shiee makes its way slowly toward Tiananmen Square, the Red Eagles gave chase on the land battleship.

"Hold it!" Jason suddenly stopped right in his tracks, prompting the other Red Eagles to do so. "They have definitely given Big Shiee some massive upgrade. We're going to need a Slug vehicle to help us bring that thing down..."

The mercenaries quickly spotted a small group of Ptolemaic Engineers performing some maintenance on a Slug Gunner.

"I think I know just the solution, buddy..." Ash said as he thought of something about the Slug Gunner.

...

"We may have overdone things a bit with those two poor guys, don't you think?" Jenny asked the others while pointing at the two Ptolemaic Engineers whom are currently tied up and dumped inside a dumpster.

"Well, the only other option was to slaughter them without a second thought, of which the Geneva Convention disagrees with on one part..." Mina gives the response.

"Engineers and field medics, regardless of affiliation, are not to be harmed under any circumstances." Jason continues that sentence. "Unless, of course, the engineers or field medics in question were also shooting at you."

With that said, Jenny entered the Slug Gunner, and started the machine up, just as a Di-Cokka and Sarubia - both Rebel variant, drove into the scene.

Under normal circumstances, a Sarubia's attacks can be avoided by jumping over the rolling mines, and the Di-Cokka by simply crouching. But in this case, one has to pretty much rely on luck if not extreme reflexes due to both types of tanks attacking at the same time.

"Now how are we going to avoid being hit by their combined attacks?" Jason took note of the situation and points it out.

"The Slug Gunner can jump higher, so get on and hold on tight!" Jenny calls out from inside the Slug Gunner.

Without thinking of anything else, Jason, Ash and Mina all grabbed tightly onto the exterior of the Slug Gunner as Jenny uses it to jump over the shells fired by the Di-Cokka and Sarubia.

"Eat this!" Just before landing, Jenny fires a single shell from the Slug Gunner's Cannon straight into the gun barrel of the Sarubia, blowing it into pieces.

Whoever's driving that Di-Cokka just sat there without firing another shot, perhaps staring at the wrecked Sarubia with his jaws dropped all the way. A couple of Grenades from the Red Eagles later, and it too is turned into scrap metal.

Another Sarubia/Di-Cokka pair drove in to engage the Red Eagles in battle, this time the Ptolemaic variants.

Although the Ptolemaic Sarubia is smaller, moves and shoot faster, it has a lot less armor than the Rebels' variant, and was quickly destroyed by one Slug Gunner shell going right through it. The Red Eagles simply crouched to avoid the shells fired by the Ptolemaic Di-Cokka while they whale on it with their combined firepower, destroying it in less than a minute.

A third Sarubia/Di-Cokka pair entered the scene. This time the Future Rebels' variant.

"Now that's gonna be a tough one..." Ash deadpanned at the sight of the Futuristic tanks.

The Future Di-Cokka isn't much different than the normal variant (aside from having very tough armor and being AI-controlled), its Plasma Cannon is still very easy to avoid. The Future Sarubia, on the other hand, fired not rolling mines, but four-legged explosive drones, which makes a mad dash towards the Slug Gunner.

The explosive drones fired by the Future Sarubia came so fast that Jenny didn't even see it coming until it exploded against the Slug Gunner, which thankfully is still intact.

"Okay, Regular Command's reports says that the Future Rebels didn't bring any Sarubias with them back during the Garbage Island Incident." Mina complained. "I guess they have learned their lessons about what to use..."

Now that the Red Eagles knew what to expect, they decided to throw every single Grenades they have with them at the Future Sarubia. But the futuristic bombing tank is so tough that even then, it still took several hundred more bullets pumped into it to finally blow it up, which caused a brand new dilemma in the form of it releasing a dozen explosive drones from its wreckage. Which is made more troublesome by the fact that there is a Future Di-Cokka sitting just behind, firing its Plasma Cannon at the same time.

"Oh, come on!" Jenny exclaims as she tries to take out the swarm of explosive drones with the Slug Gunner's Gatling Gun. The last one almost made contact with the bipedal tank before Ash smashed it flat with the sharp end of his Chainsaw.

The Red Eagles proceed to finish off the Future Di-Cokka. This completely uses up the remaining ammunition of the **Rocket Launcher** and **Shotgun**.

"The next time I see a Sarubia/Di-Cokka combo..."

...

The next part of the Red Eagles' mission consisted of them running forward without stopping while gunning down any enemies that comes to attack them. At one point they came across a Double-Decker Bus which the Rebels modified to be used as a makeshift stronghold (just like they did with one in the Kowloon District of Hong Kong years ago). Like everything else the RAPs threw at the Red Eagles, the Double-Decker Bus is wrecked after several hundred rounds being emptied into it.

Beyond that Double-Decker Bus, the Red Eagles came across an entire mob of quite possibly every variant of Girida-O's, Di-Cokkas and Bradleys which sometimes even came from behind them. Thanks to Jenny and the Slug Gunner, the mercenaries were able to speed through this mob in a short amount of time.

By the time the Red Eagles reached the end of that street, they have left behind countless tank wreckages and corpses of RAP Joint Forces troops.

"Now that's what I'd call a tank burger!" Jason threw in a joke at the end of it.

...

Location: Tiananmen Square; Beijing, China.

The Red Eagles managed to reach Tiananmen Square without additional challenges from the RAP Joint Forces.

"That's weird..." Ash noticed the surprising silence of the square. "I thought our target will be hanging out around here somewhere..."

Before anyone else can speak another word, the mercenaries are greeted by a series of localized tremors and loud engine noises...

...From directly behind them.

The Red Eagles looked at each other, swallowed hard, before turning around to see what's behind them.

It's the land battleship - Big Shiee.

"Speaks of the devil..." Mina hangs a lamp regarding the sudden appearance of Big Shiee.

"I'm still surprised as to how this thing managed to avoid being detected for so long..." Jenny hangs another lamp on a different subject.

**Boss battle: _Big Shiee_.**

Big Shiee didn't wait for the Red Eagles to do anything first as it tries to run them over.

"Look out!" Jason warned his friends loudly just in time for everyone to jump out of the way of the land battleship's tracks.

Seeing how the Red Eagles avoided being ran over, Big Shiee aimed and fired its small cannons at them. This upgraded version fired its guns at a faster rate.

Jason, Ash and Mina were able to easily dodge the energy shells, but Jenny in the Slug Gunner isn't so lucky due to the bipedal tank being a bigger target.

"I don't think the Slug Gunner can take another hit!" Jenny told the others.

"Then we should quickly take out its small guns!" Jason said. "This guy won't reveal its big gun - which is also its weakest point - until all the small guns are down!"

Taking the suggestion into account, the Red Eagles focused their firepower on the double-barreled guns. It took several hundred bullets to destroy those two double-barreled guns (the mercenaries have no Grenades left due to spending them all on the Future Sarubia earlier), and it was no easy feat when every single guns were firing shells like once every three seconds.

Destroying the rest of the small guns turned out to be _harder_, not _easier_, due to Big Shiee getting more aggressive with its attacks with each small guns taken out. In fact, the last small gun was firing about three shells every second before being blown up.

Just as Jason said, the land battleship revealed its main cannon as soon as the last small gun went out.

"Look out, guys. This thing definitely packs more punch than its past incarnation." Jason warns his friends.

He was right. Big Shiee's main cannon not only fired shells at a faster rate, the shells were travelling faster as well as being napalm shells.

One of the shells impacted the Slug Gunner directly. The damage to the bipedal tank became so severe, Jenny had to bail out before it explodes.

"Why did they always get the good toys?!" Jenny yells out furiously, as she begins firing on the main cannon with her handgun.

Due to not having any special weapons, Grenades nor Slug vehicles, the Red Eagles had to all fight Big Shiee's main cannon with just their handgun and melee weapons, the latter of which is extremely risky considering that the main cannon fired napalm shells at a fast rate. They pretty much have no strategy other than just whaling on Big Shiee's main cannon while avoiding its shells.

It took the Red Eagles 30 whole minutes to finally bring down Big Shiee's main cannon with their Handguns. When they do, a series of chain reaction blew the land battleship into a complete pile of wreckage.

**_Big Shiee_**** defeated.**

When that is done, the Red Eagles collapsed on the ground due to exhaustion.

"Man, that's the hardest battle we've ever had..." Jason complains about it.

"We can only blame the Regular Army for the failed mission that started everything..." Jenny added in.

"But then we'll never have the job of fighting the Rebels..." So did Ash.

"For now, we can only await being extracted from here by the Regular Army, and be on our way toward the next mission..." As did Mina.

**MISSION SIX COMPLETE!**

* * *

**Afterwords**

One year of progress... all lost in a second...

I was just playing _Metal Slug Defense_ on my phone, farming MSP from fighting the boss of the Ptolemaic-related event (which is the Sandmarine), when my phone suddenly decides to run out of power as I was starting the level. Upon restarting the game, it _forgets_ _me ever even starting it!_

Oh God! Over a year worth of progress! All 12 Bonus Stages in the Main Worlds! All Main World stages! All Extra World stages! All Missions! All POWs! All Medals-purchased Units (Black Hound, SV-001 Advanced, Ptolemaic Slug, Special Force APC, Hi-Do, Leona, King, Slug Armor, Double-Decker Bus which is mistakenly named "Morden Bus", and the M-3 Rocket Launch Support Van which is mistakenly named "Parachute Truck")! All upgrades! The Dai-Manji! The Regular Army Helicopter! Over 2000 Medals earned from PVP, Login Bonuses and Events alone (I didn't use my credit cards once on this game)! Over 1 Million MSP! Over 10K PVP Scores! Over one hundred PVP wins! All lost in just a split second!

Even worse! It happened just a few minutes before I continued writing this chapter from where the Red Eagles starts attacking Big Shiee's main cannon!

From now on, _Metal Slug Defense_ is officially uninstalled from my phone, FOREVER!

I'm too heartbroken to write the Shout-out Index and the punchline...


	9. Chapter 8: Sinking Feeling part 1

**Forewords**

This chapter's Forewords have nothing to do with the storyline of _Metal Slug: Mercenaries_, but rather, my progress on restoring my lost _Metal Slug Defense_ data.

My original deck consisted of, in order: Sandbag, Morden Bus, Regular Army Helicopter, Donald Morden, Leona, King, Parachute Truck, Slug Armor, Black Hound and Cyborg Allen O'Neil.

My current deck consists of, in order: Sandbag, Morden Bus, Gen Morden Ver Di-Cokka, Slug Gigant, Leona, King, Parachute Truck, Slug Armor, Black Hound and Slug Trolley.

I've replaced the Regular Army Helicopter with the Slug Gigant since there's no way to get it back again, Donald Morden with Gen Morden Ver Di-Cokka because that guy in a Di-Cokka is actually more useful and more resistant to knockback (but standard attacks are slower, much to my disappointment), and Cyborg Allen O'Neil with Slug Trolley because it is cheaper and faster producing (although not as fast moving, I admit).

But, hanging out around the_ Metal Slug Defense Guide_ blog by a Korean blogger called Hyun has taught me something else about my current deck: 1)Hyun thinks that the Morden Bus isn't that useful due to how weak the Rebel soldiers were (at least better than the other spawners, though), and 2) The Slug Trolley was only useful in Single-Player, it gets destroyed very easily in PVP, and 3)Hyun himself doesn't think this way, but in my opinion, the Slug Armor is _completely__ useless_ against Huge Hermit (especially that upgraded version from Extra World 3 stage 7 which I dubbed Huge Hermit Mk2) because that thing is only capable of Close Quarter Combat, and Huge Hermit chews up melee-only units more than it eats breakfasts.

* * *

**Chapter 8: Sinking Feeling, part 1**

Time: 0500 Hour; 31st of December, 2040.

Location: Somewhere over the Indian Ocean.

After getting airlifted from Beijing, the Red Eagles took about two hours to recover as the cargo plane took them not eastwards toward Regular Army Command in Virginia, USA, but westwards toward the middle of the Indian Ocean. The Red Eagles just assumed that another mission will be conducted soon, and said nothing about it.

"Boy, was I glad to be away from that land battleship..." Jason recalled the battle with Big Shiee from back at Beijing.

"Yeah, do tell me..." Jenny took her turn to comment on the same thing. "...If the Regular Commandos have had a similar problem in the past decade."

"Can we all forget about that much hated battle?" Ash attempted to break up the conversation by complaining. "All we know is that this cargo tanker just suddenly appeared in the middle of the Indian Ocean, and Regular Command traced it all the way back to a RAP facility in Kamchatka, Russia that just self-destructed two hours ago..."

"The cargo tanker in question has somehow went through the maritime territories of Japan, South Korea, China and The Philippines without either countries detecting it on their radars." Mina explained the main point of the next mission to everyone. "It would've slip past the Regular Army's noses were it not for the crew of a Malaysian aircraft carrier seeing 'a suspicious civilian cargo ship' with their naked eyes."

_"Yeah, it makes you wonder anyway how the RAPs were able to pull that off. Even the presence of the Future Rebels does not begin to explain it."_ The pilot of the plane, Flynn Taggart cuts in via the intercoms. _"That being said, we should all get ready to HAHO Jump. We're nearing the cargo ship in question."_

"Yeah, we should..." Jason agreed. As he was about to put on a parachute pack, something caught his attention immediately. "Wait a minute... 'we'?"

The door to the cockpit opened, and out came the man that was supposed to be the pilot of the plane. "President Drippiek suddenly told Regular Command that he wanted me and my buddy, Leon Chan to join the four of you in every mission starting with this one."

The Red Eagles looked at the rear end of the cargo plane, and sees the Asian-American mercenary they can only assume is the Leon Chan mentioned.

"I'll be honored to work alongside you." Leon told the Red Eagles.

The Red Eagles turned back toward Flynn, and all gave the deadpan look at the same time.

"I think we all better keep our mouth shut whenever we're around the Regular Commandos..." Ash commented with deadpan. "Marco and his friends are not gonna like having their spotlight stolen yet again."

_..._

**_Mission Briefing_**

_I do hope you've took enough rest on they way from Beijing, Red Eagles, because you're going to be running some more within a few minutes._

_As you know, the RAP Joint Forces have suddenly deployed a seemingly unarmed cargo ship in the middle of the Indian Ocean, where nothing of notable interest have shown up so far. Regular Army's SPARROWS Intelligence Unit traced its origins all the way back to the Kamchatka Peninsula of Russia, but the RAP facility there somehow self-destructed before we can even begin a UAV surveillance on it. Failing to identify the true purpose of the facility, we have decided to try and identify the cargo ship in question._

_When the results came in, SPARROWS said they were surprised at the cargo ship being one usually used by Kanegawa Military Industries, the Japanese military contractor that funded the Super Vehicles program since the First Morden War. Apparently, KMI reported to us that one of their cargo ships went missing off the east coast of Japan a week ago, and we've hit a dead end on the search and investigation until two hours ago where it suddenly appeared where you were being taken to._

_Your mission will be as follows: HAHO Jump and land on the bow of the cargo ship, where you will then proceed to fight your way through the occupying RAP Joint Force troops. You will then proceed to the bridge of the ship and find out what happened to the ship a week ago as well as where it is currently headed. But beware, the exterior of the ship may be guarded by enemy aircrafts including two massive ones we are currently unable to identify. Use maximum firepower against those big ones if necessary._

_One last point: for some reason, President Balthazar Drippiek has decided that the four of you are better off being accompanied by Leon Chi-Ming Chan and Flynn "Mack" Taggart. Why he specifically named those two men is not something I am able to answer at the moment. However, you will soon learn that the two of them can be valuable to your missions, especially when you're in a tight situation._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

_..._

**Leon Chi-Ming Chan and Flynn "Mack" Taggart joins the party!**

**MISSION SEVEN START!**

Location: Stern Deck, Kanegawa Military Industries cargo ship "_Orochi_"; somewhere in the Indian Ocean.

The Red Eagles and their two newest teammates performed a flawless and uninterrupted HAHO (High Altitude High Opening) Jump and landed on the deck of the stern of the cargo ship, which is apparently named the _Orochi_, as the Japanese Hiragana on one of the nearby life rafts read out. There were no RAP patrols near the stern at the moment, but the mercenaries (although Flynn and Leon were technically considered as Marines) were being quiet with packing up their parachutes anyway.

The mercenaries double-checked their equipment just in case. The weirdness of Flynn "Mack" Taggart's equipment drew the attention of the Red Eagles.

"Okay, just how on earth do you fit that thing in your pocket?" Jason asked the over-equipped Marine soldier.

Flynn took note of the Red Eagles mercenary while the former was... somehow stuffing an energy gun that, including its power-supplying backpack, is bigger than the Marine himself into his pocket. "Maybe because I'm the protagonist of a First Person Shooter?"

"This isn't _Call Of Duty_, you know..." Jenny throws in a comment.

Ash looked over the guard rails at the back of the ship stern, only to immediately take a step back to avoid being seen by a passing-by Hover Vehicle. "Yeah, we better keep an eye out above our heads..." He told the others.

...

Getting to the bridge of the _Orochi_ was no easy feat. First of all, although the Red Eagles and Marines' side of the deck is on an elevation only a meter below the deck where the bridge is, there is a gap between the two positions that are too far away for even an Ostrich Slug to clear; secondly, there are no shortcuts, not even improvised ones, which means the mercenaries will have to take the long way and face tons of RAP troops; thirdly and lastly, it would seem that one of the two "big ones" mentioned in the AI CO's briefing is sticking around above the bridge (the environment is too dark for anyone to see what the massive airplane looked like).

"Some lousy way to spent New Year's Eve..." Flynn complained as he walked down a stair that leads to a lower deck.

Of course, just like any military operations, the Red Eagles and Marines were almost instantly spotted by an enemy. In this case, a Pirate.

The Pirate took potshots at the mercenaries with his flintlock pistol, but none of them hits.

Jason was about to retaliate with his handgun when Leon Chan suddenly whips out a **Shotgun** and blasted the Pirate's head clean off.

"Holy sh..." Jenny exclaimed in surprise. "Where did you get that **Shotgun**?"

Leon cocked the **Shotgun** once, ejecting a spent shell before replying, "Well, Fio always carried a spare **Heavy Machine Gun** with her into missions."

There was no doubt that the ruckus has drawn unwanted attention. In this case, it was an Amadeus Syndicalist who freaked out before running off.

"Speaking of which, what were pirates doing around here, anyway?" It was Flynn who wondered about the question.

"Weren't you in the Intelligence Unit? The Amadeus Syndicate did get help from Pirates the last time they hijacked a cargo ship." Ash answers.

Realizing what the chainsaw-toting mercenary said was correct, the Marine slapped himself on the forehead. "Oh, how can I forget about it? That slaps me on the head..."

...

The next thing the Red Eagles and Marines came across was a Patrol Robot... Along with a Rebel Walker that suddenly jumped down from the deck above, which then deploys a miniature attack satellite to fire energy shots at the mercenaries with.

"Incoming!" Jason dodged the shots of the Rebel Walker's miniature attack satellite (which seems to self-destruct after just firing a few shots), and then fires a bullet straight into the weaponized lens of the Patrol Robot before it can fire its laser beam.

Ash and Mina both rushed toward the Rebel Walker with their melee weapons raised, and sliced into the little robot as they passed by. Although the slices did not do in the Rebel Walker, Flynn rushed in after them and... somehow did it in with his bare hands (Ralf Jones can also do this, although Flynn's punch made his looked weak), smashing it into several pieces.

"Eh... I can't think of any comment on that..." Jason stammered at the sight of Flynn's punching the Rebel Walker to pieces.

The mercenaries, upon getting to the lower deck, were mobbed by a large number of Rebel Soldiers coming from every direction, some arriving via parachutes. The Red Eagles quickly finishes off the mob of Rebels, only to immediately be mobbed by Amadeus Syndicalists, then Ptolemaic Guerillas, and then Future Rebels. It took the combined efforts of the Red Eagles and the Marines to bring down the seemingly endless mob.

"Okay, I never have to fight this many enemies in all my previous tours of duty..." Flynn pointed out to everyone.

...

There were a lot of RAP patrols at the lowest deck where the mercenaries are now overlooking. Despite hiding behind cover, they still felt uneasy due to all the Masknell and R-Shobu variants frequently flying past this portion of the deck.

"One has to wonder just what is the cargo of this ship that made the RAPs place such a tight security all over the deck..." Flynn hung a lamp on the tightness of the patrols. "Granted, they wouldn't be much of a problem, but none of the three factions ever had so many men in one place."

All of a sudden, the megaphones placed all over the cargo ship blared out loud noises in an indeterminate sequence, followed by all RAP Joint Force infantries leaving their posts and retreating into the interior of the ship. All that's left on the decks afterwards were Pirates, Patrol Robots, Rebel Walkers, Masknell variants and R-Shobu variants.

"Now its even easier..." Leon pointed out to his fellow Marine. "However, this could be suspicious..." The Chinese-American added as he cocked his **Shotgun**.

"As much as I hate to admit it, he's right." Jason said. "Why would they suddenly retreat for no apparent reason? It definitely is fishy..."

At that moment, a particularly big tidal wave splashed over the deck, soaking the mercenaries all over. The same splash has even placed a wriggling fish on top of Jason's head.

"I resist the urge to make a fishy joke." Jenny joked about it as she grabs the fish and throws it overboard.

...

Location: Lower Decks, KMI cargo ship "_Orochi_"

Dealing with the remaining enemies was quite easy even with just handguns. The Pirates mostly preferred using their cutlasses despite having guns of their own. The Patrol Robots may have an indestructible casing, but their weaponized lens were too big of a target for any shooters to miss (not to mention quite fragile). The Rebel Walkers were easily dealt with due to their questionable combat tactics (that is, get as close to their target as possible before extending their impractically short knives, even though they have ranged weapons). The Masknell and R-Shobu variants were slightly more difficult to deal with, but for some reason only one of them attacks at a time (their best method were to attack in pairs and even that is easily dealt with).

It didn't take the Red Eagles and Marines too much time before they reached a wide open air portion of the deck. They looked around their current location to confirm that there are no more enemies at the moment.

"A very wide area with not a single hostile on sight." Flynn analyzed the location, and became suspicious. "My Marine sense is telling me that they have a big bad boy or two 'round here..."

Although Flynn pretty much tempted fate, the Red Eagles did not give him the look, seeing how he could be right.

"I agree. Not once did we ever come across a wide area that doesn't have a titanic war machine or one of the enemy leaders' lieutenants hanging around." Ash added in, whipping out his chainsaw in anticipation of an ambush. "Maybe its one of those 'big ones' mentioned in the mission briefing..."

The increasingly louder noise of a pair of jet engines confirmed everyone's suspicion. They looked up, and saw a massive VTOL bomber that has been modified into a dropship/gunship hybrid.

"Yep, just like the old days for me." Flynn threw in a comment while looking at the VTOL.

"It's the same for me too, friend." Leon told his fellow Marine.

"Well, I don't care what you've faced in your past tours of duty..." Jenny told the Marines as she points her handgun at the aircraft. "...We're going to take this bastard down..."

**Boss Battle: _The Kessi_**

The original Kessi deployed Arabian Soldiers and had two Rebel Bazooka Soldiers providing support fire from above it. This version deployed Pirates, and had Ptolemaic Bazooka Guerillas providing support fire.

But since the Kessi itself isn't directly attacking at the moment, all the Red Eagles and Marines needed to do was to just whale on the massive VTOL while occasionally redirecting their shots on the Pirates and avoiding the shots fired by the Bazooka Guerillas.

"The first phase may be piece of cake, but the second phase won't be so easy!" Mina reminded the others as she continues firing on the Kessi and the occasional Pirates.

Several hundred rounds later, the Kessi took enough damage that it entered the second phase of its attack in which two Bull Chan tanks somehow appeared on top of its wings for no apparent reason. The massive VTOL has also started using its jet engines as makeshift flamethrowers.

"Now this phase is much harder..." Ash pointed out as he narrowly evades a shell fired by one of the Bull Chan tanks.

The worst part with this phase is that the Bull Chan tanks upon running out of ammunitions will perform a last hurrah by driving off the Kessi and dropping themselves onto the mercenaries. This attack was quite difficult to avoid (especially with the Bazooka Guerillas and the jet engines firing at the same time), and the one that almost crushed Flynn was only stopped at the last second by the Marine's absurdly powerful punch.

"Oh, come on! I would rather fight the original Kessi!" Jason complained. In a fit of rage, the red-clad mercenary jumped into the air and Vulcan Chopped the lower hull of the Kessi.

"You call that a super punch?" Flynn mocked Jason's Vulcan Chop and, after punching out another falling Bull Chan tank, jumped into the air and punched the exact same spot on the Kessi's hull. "See what my Berserk Punch can do!"

The Marine's even more powerful super punch _literally punched a hole_ on the hull of the massive VTOL. And it apparently struck something important too, because both of the Kessi's jet engines soon totaled, causing a chain reaction that caused it to slowly descend while bursting into flames, taking out the Bull Chan tanks and Bazooka Guerillas as well. The massive VTOL exploded once upon crash landing onto the deck, rendering it into an aircraft-shaped pile of wreckage. A few seconds later, it exploded again, this time into shrapnel that flew towards every direction.

_**The Kessi**_** defeated.**

"Not to be anti-climatic..." Leon throws in a line after having helped shoot down the Kessi. By that point, the Chinese-American Marine's **Shotgun** has ran out of ammo. "The Kessi itself did not receive any upgrades, it merely used a different attack strategy. I would rate it one out of five stars for the complete lack of its own weapons."

Flynn was about to say something when the wrecked chassis of a Bull Chan suddenly landed right on top of him, almost crushing him underneath. The Marine's sole response to being crushed was poking his right hand out from under the chassis, accompanied with a subtle "That didn't hurt."

The Red Eagles chuckled at the sight.

"This might be the most amusing hit I've ever seen someone take." Jenny comments on the condition Flynn is currently in.

...

Location: The Bridge, KMI cargo ship "_Orochi_".

Donald Morden was on the bridge of the _Orochi_, overlooking whatever operations the RAP Joint Force are conducting on the holds of the cargo ship. Amadeus was nowhere to be seen, and so was the Ptolemaic Boss.

"You never played fair, President Balthazar Drippiek, so why should I?" The Devil Rebirth said under his breath.

There was no one present to make a response to Morden's speech.

"I used to tell my son this: sometimes you have to fight fire with fire." Morden added to his speech. "Never have I believed that I would actually be doing it, even if it means going against the Geneva Convention."

After spending several minutes all alone on the bridge, the general turned around and walked toward the doorway that led to the deck, where the Hi-Do helicopter is parked. He stopped just in front of the doorway.

"If that is the case, then I will do whatever it takes to bring down the Drippiek Administration, the Regular Army, their precious Commandos..." Morden proclaimed with his right hand clenched into a fist. "...And their scapegoat, the Mercenaries..."

...

Location: Lower Decks, KMI cargo ship "_Orochi_".

The Mercenaries looked at the massive aircraft that is hanging out above the bridge of the cargo ship.

"No questioning now that the other 'big one' is the Kessi III..." Jason said as he identifies the aircraft in question.

"Only thing needed questioning is the upgrades they gave to it." Jenny adds in.

"No matter what upgrades they give to their war machines, we Red Eagles are gonna rip them all into pieces!" Ash boasted while brandishing his chainsaw.

"Nebāgibuappu!" [Never give up!] Mina cheered in Japanese.

"I understand little Japanese, but I'm with Miss Kabuto on this." Leon speaks up as he loaded his handgun.

"Whatever big thing's up there will soon join everything else in the junk yard!" Flynn boasted hammily while... showing off his abnormally huge energy gun.

"Hey." Leon warned his fellow Marine. "Watch where you point the BFG-9000."

That drew the Red Eagles men's attention, even if it wasn't supposed to.

"BFG-9000?" Jason exclaimed in surprise. "THE BFG-9000?!"

"You Marines seriously defictionalized the most iconic weapons of the _Doom_ video game series?!" Ash joined in the exclamation. "What's next? The Rock-It Launcher?"

The Mercenaries stopped their current discussion upon remembering that it has nothing to do with their current mission. They carried on by climbing up a flight of stairs that leads to an upper deck, with the bridge of the _Orochi_ at the very top of this set of decks.

The first thing they encounter on that deck was a Pirate Fighter, who didn't even get to swing his sword once before being Vulcan Chopped to bits by Jason.

Several more Pirates and Pirate Fighters appeared from around the corner as well as behind the Mercenaries and attacked en-masse. Despite the large numbers and the ambush they've had, the Pirates were quickly decimated by the Mercenaries.

"Even after all those tours of duty I've had in my past, I still don't get why a lone enemy infantry is much more dangerous than a whole mob of them." Flynn hangs a lamp on the phenomenon, scratching his head as he spoke.

"You should be glad that's the case." Ash told the Marine. "Mummies, zombies, mutants, aliens... everything seems to be incompetent when they are operating in large number. This unfortunately applies to the Regular Army too, for one Metal Slug has a higher chance of survival than an entire armada of them."

A Rebel Walker suddenly dropped down from the deck above and extended its knife, almost stabbing Leon in the process. The Chinese-American Marine retaliates by lifting the Rebel Walker up and throwing it overboard into the ocean.

Getting on with their current mission, the Mercenaries went up another floor and encountered a Supervisory Camera that was hung directly above an Ammo Box.

"I will handle this." Mina told the others before throwing a single Grenade that blew up both the Ammo Box and the Supervisory Camera guarding it.

The Ammo Box yielded a **Grenade Launcher**.

"Now that's something you don't normally see these days: a **Grenade Launcher**." Jenny said as she picked up the weapon.

As soon as the blue-clad female mercenary picked up that weapon, a Ptolemaic Regimental Masknell squad suddenly appeared from out of nowhere and started firing upon everyone.

"Look out!" Ash shouted out, calling for everyone to take cover as the Ptolemaic Regimental Masknell squad peppered the deck with bullets.

"Not on my watch!" Jenny proclaimed, and proceeds to fire the **Grenade Launcher** at the leader of the Ptolemaic Regimental Masknell squad. Five shots were fired from the **Grenade Launcher**, two missed and detonated somewhere on the starboard deck, one had hit the last member of the helicopter regiment (not doing enough damage to destroy it), but the two that does hit their intended target destroyed the leader of the Ptolemaic Regimental Masknell leader, which led to a chain reaction that took out the rest of the squad.

The rest of the Mercenaries watched in awe how the **Grenade Launcher** destroyed a Ptolemaic Masknell in seconds.

"Imagine the carnage if Kasamoto-san gets her hand on that weapon..." Mina shrugged, thinking of what she just said.

...

The Mercenaries moved on to the next floor. They were almost at the bridge of the _Orochi_, when a Future R-Shobu appeared and started dropping plasma bombs on them.

"Dammit, another one of these Future Rebels' future tech..." Ash complained while barely getting out of the way of a volley of plasma bombs.

"Well, nothing's more futuristic than THIS!" Flynn suddenly chewed the scenery, as he whips out the BFG-9000 and fired a single blast of destructive laser that pretty much made the Future R-Shobu cease to exist... along with the deck the Mercenaries first HAHO Jumped onto.

The Red Eagles once again dropped their jaws at such a sight.

Leon slapped Flynn on the back of his head, and berated him. "If Kanegawa Military Industries asks you to pay for the repairs, I won't help you, and neither will the Regular Army."

...

Location: Outside the bridge, KMI cargo ship "_Orochi_"

The rest of the Mercenaries' trek toward the bridge can be best described as such: a lot of R-Shobu, Masknell, Hover Units and Hover Vehicles went to feed the fishes, as do the same amount of Patrol Robots, Rebel Walkers and Pirates.

By the time they actually reached the bridge, Jenny's **Grenade Launcher** is already used up.

The Red Eagles and Marines arrived at the bridge of the cargo ship and found someone they weren't told by Regular Command would be present: Donald Morden himself.

"So, Morden..." Jason, not surprised one bit by this, tries to start a conversation he knew wouldn't last long (especially not when the Kessi III is on standby right above the bridge). "How does it feel like, knowing that Regular Army threw a very large spanner into your works by sending us instead of the Commandos after you?"

Morden's answer was surprisingly subtle. "I don't even care if President Drippiek is playing dirty anymore..."

"So why do you think teaming up with the Amadeus Syndicate and Ptolemaic Army would help you with your plans?" Ash threw in his own question at the leader of the Rebel Army. "Is it because both Amadeus and the Ptolemaic Boss have bones to pick with Regular Command too?"

"Why else did you think I chose to work with them?" Morden delivered yet another subtle answer.

"As much as I hate to admit it, the Regular Army really is partially to blame for everything in the past decade..." Jenny pitied the general. "Your son would still be alive today were it not for the intel-lacking mission he was sent on..."

This time, Morden said nothing. Perhaps the mentioning of his late son triggered something deep within him.

And then, Flynn Taggart, the trigger-happiness within him that Marines are usually associated with decided to wreck the emotional moment instantly by loudly proclaiming, "Enough talk! LET'S KICK HIS ASS!"

Leon Chan seems to have noticed something in the surrounding, and stopped Flynn by pulling his collar.

The Chinese-American was right to stop his fellow Marine, because the Kessi III suddenly slammed one of its propellant-lacking missiles onto the bridge, destroying it instantly and seemingly taking Morden with it.

The ensuing explosion sent the Red Eagles and the Marines staggering backwards. Mina was almost blown off the railing, but managed to hold on.

"Jeez! That's why I never joined the Marines!" Jason exclaimed, with the line directed straight at Flynn in anger.

When the Mercenaries regained their standing, they see that the Hi-Do has taken off, and Morden has somehow gotten on board without so much as a scratch.

"You government-supporting military types!" The general called out in a taunting manner as the Hi-Do flew higher off the deck. "Like Allen used to tell the Regular Commandos: See you in hell!"

With that, the Devil Rebirth got away... again.

"We'll deal with you later, Flynn 'Mack' Taggart..." Ash gave the Marine the look, before turning toward the massive VTOL that he and his teammates will be fighting in the next minute or so.

**Boss battle: _The Kessi III_.**

The original Kessi III fired its independent-aiming machine guns in a predictable manner and would focus solely on suppressive fire as it deployed Rebel Soldiers and readied its propellant-lacking missile which doesn't even have any explosives inside it. This upgraded version fires its machine guns at a higher rate in an unpredictable spread while deploying Ptolemaic Special Force Troopers at random intervals and, as demonstrated with its destroying the bridge, the propellant-lacking missile is now loaded with compressed napalm.

Evading the unpredictable machine gun spray was easier said than done. Many times, the Red Eagles and Mercenaries managed to dodge the spray of one gun only to immediately get caught in the spray of the other gun.

"There's very little opportunity to shoot at that thin when you're spending most of the battle avoiding its shots!" Jason said as he Vulcan Chops a Special Force Trooper while evading a spray of bullets.

Flynn attempted to jump onto the Kessi III and Berserk Punch it on its fuselage. Unfortunately for the Marine, the VTOL is agile enough to actually evade it, and Flynn ended up punching thin air instead.

In retaliation, the Kessi III readied a propellant-lacking missile and slammed it down hard on the deck. The attack wasn't targeting anyone in particular, but the missile actually produced a large fireball on impact which also sent out a shockwave that caused the Mercenaries to lose their footing and trip.

"What's with the RAP Joint Force and extreme pyrotechnics, anyway?" Ash complained as he got up, and offhand-slashed a Special Force Trooper that was about to backstab him.

"I'm thinking that Morden has become desperate enough that he started disregarding the Geneva Convention." Jason took the opportunity to reply before he had to evade a machine gun spray, which ended up friendly-firing a Special Force Trooper.

Flynn attempted to Berserk Punch the Kessi III again. This time, he timed his jump with the moment the VTOL descends to deploy Special Force Troopers, and managed to land a hit on it.

The Berserk Punch was enough to cause the Kessi III to enter its second attack phase as its fuselage bursts into flames due to the damage sustained. In this phase, the VTOL stopped deploying Special Force Troopers, but became a lot more aggressive with its two machine guns while using its propellant-lacking missile at every opportunity it gets.

"Was the original one this crazy with its attacks?!" Jenny exclaims in response to the Kessi III spamming the missile-slamming attack at the interval of every five seconds.

Shockwave after shockwave coming from the propellant-lacking missile practically gave the Mercenaries no chance to gain their footing and shoot back at the Kessi III. The Mercenaries' only way to avoid the spray of machine gun bullets that came at the same time was to roll out of the way.

"Someone please shoot this thing down from the sky!" Mina screamed out in anguish after getting knocked over several times by the missile attack.

"I'm not going to shoot it down..." Flynn said. The Marine managed to get back on his feet in less than a second. "I'm gonna punch that sonova' bitch down!" With that said, he jumped into the air just as the Kessi III was about to slam another missile down on the deck.

Getting a second Berserk Punch to its hull absolutely wrecked the VTOL. Its engines failed, causing it to crash onto the deck and explode into a non-functional plane-shaped wreckage.

_**The Kessi III**_** defeated.**

As if to mock the RAP Joint Force, Flynn pulled out the BFG-9000 and blasted the wreckage of the Kessi III at point blank range. The blast wasn't at full power, so it merely blew the VTOL overboard and into the ocean.

The Red Eagles got up, looked at what the Marine did to the Kessi III, and breathed a sigh of relief in unison.

"I'm so glad that thing was sent down to the seabed..."

"But now that the bridge is destroyed, what are we going to do?"

With that last bit of realization, the Red Eagles and Marines turned toward the now destroyed bridge of the _Orochi_. Now they are unable to determine how it was hijacked in the first place, nor where it is currently headed.

"Damn. Looks like Morden had it planned out early..." Leon remarked.

**MISSION SEVEN COMPLETE!**

* * *

**Afterwords**

Looks like there will be a new Event in _Metal Slug Defense_ on October 6th. From the looks of it, there was going to be another crossover aside from _The King Of Fighters_...

Okay, I'm guessing that some of you may not get the buffs I've applied to the bosses, so I'll be listing the buffs in the Afterwords section from this chapter on.

The Kessi: not exactly a buff per se. This version deployed Guerilla Bazookas and Pirates while using the Bull Chan tanks at the same time. The original deployed Arabian Soldiers which were only slightly weaker than Pirates, and only deployed those two Rebel Bazooka Soldiers in its second phase.

The Kessi III: deploys Ptolemaic Special Force Troopers instead of Rebel Soldiers. Its also a lot more aggressive with its machine guns and missile-slam. The aforementioned missile-slam also now produces a huge fireball as opposed to merely acting like a disposable jackhammer.

Regarding the details of the previous chapter: no, _Metal Slug 7_ has no such thing as a Future Sarubia. That's another one of my self-made upgrades.

Although you can probably imagine how crazy it can be to fight a Di-Cokka and Sarubia at the same time. Maybe that's why both official games and fan games do not spawn those two at once.

The **Grenade Launcher** is **not** an official weapon. It only appears in the fan game _Metal Slug 5 Elite_.

Finally, Kanegawa Military Industries is an original faction created by Soldier Of The Future, as with Leon Chan and Flynn Taggart. Thanks, man!

Shout-out index:

"Maybe because I'm the protagonist of a First-Person Shooter?" - Interesting enough, Soldier Of The Future did base Flynn "Mack" Taggart upon the Doomguy from _Doom_. So in a sense, he's actually telling the truth.

BFG-9000 - see the above shout-out to get what I'm talking about.

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	10. Chapter 9: Sinking Feeling part 2

**Forewords**

New update Ver 1.34 arrived for _Metal Slug Defense_ on October 6th, and you know what my opinion on it was?

CAAAAAATTTTSSS!

Honestly though, what the heck was SNK Playmore smoking when they decided to do a crossover with _Battle Cats_?! The Cats are so horrible that absolutely nobody would consider using them, not even in Single-player Mode! The absolute worst was the basic Cat! Although it has a super fast movement speed and production, it dies in one hit from anything! You're better off with the basic Rebel Infantry! Not to mention that the _Battle Cats_ Event Stages were so easy even the "HELL!" difficulty level can be beaten by a noob and his crap deck!

But then SNK has had enough of the fandom's whining on how incredibly ball-sucking Ver 1.34 was. So they put up a Ver 1.35 two weeks later, and BOY! Was the fandom finally satisfied with it! The new stages were quite challenging, especially the one where the Cat Base spams an endless amount of Black Wall Cats to the point that even the Slug Gigant is helpless against them, and that other one where the Cat Base spawn a Bun Bun Black _right at the beginning_! Oh, and did I mention that the Iron Nokameow (yes, Iron Noka**meow**, not Iron Noka**na**) has a Special Attack that not only hits the entire field but does a ton of damage too? Only downside to the Iron Nokameow is that its Special Attack takes forever to charge, and the unit itself is also jet engine fuel for the Kessi II. If anything, I would say that Iron Nokameow is best reserved as a wall unit to temporarily halt enemy advancements.

Okay, that's it for my personal opinion on the _Battle Cats_ Collaboration Event. Look forward to the Kraken (hopefully) on November 4th.

* * *

**Chapter 9: Sinking Feeling part 2**

Time: 0730 Hour, 31st of December, 2040.

Location: Cargo Holds, KMI cargo ship "_Orochi_"; somewhere in the Indian Ocean.

The relative silence of the most overlooked corner of the _Orochi_'s cargo holds was slightly disturbed when the Red Eagles and Marines came down there in a hurry via a conveniently placed ventilation shaft. The Mercenaries' arrival was followed by an explosion that travelled down the same ventilation shaft, which they evade by lying on the floor.

"Well, that was a close one." Jason commented on the fireball. "Can't believe that Future R-Shobu was crazy enough to airlift a Bull Chan and drop it right on top of us."

"Back in my old tours of duties, I've seen many examples of vehicles being dropped on people's heads by aircrafts." Flynn told everyone present. "But this is the first time someone did it in a sneaky way."

The Mercenaries looked back at the ventilation shaft they came through, and sees it charred and in shambles as a result of the fireball.

"Now let us hope that the RAP Joint Force weren't crazy enough to sink this whole ship just to make sure we won't win." Jenny remarked.

...

**_Mission briefing_**

_Never expected General Morden to have the Kessi III demolish the bridge of the _Orochi_ in response to your arrival there. But nevertheless, you Mercenaries did a good job thinning out the RAP Joint Force troops on board._

_However, it is not the time to relax just yet. For all Regular Command remembers, the last cargo ship that was hijacked by the Amadeus Syndicate was sunk slowly after they've lost hold of it. So there is no questioning that they intend to do the same to this one._

_Find your way to the stern deck ASAP, where you will be airlifted and taken to your next objectives, which I cannot tell you right now due to suspected eavesdropping by the RAPs. Use whatever forces necessary to fend off the RAP Joint Force troops on your way, and try to keep the _Orochi_ in one piece and floating if possible, as the KMI have much irreplaceable valuable cargo on board including the latest models of Slug vehicle prototypes._

_Do it quick, as the SPARROWS have detected two large submarines headed toward your current location, and we can all guest the purpose of those two subs._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

**MISSION EIGHT START!**

"Now I don't plan on sleeping with the fishes anytime soon, so let's get the hell outta this place." Ash voices his thoughts on the transmission from the Regular Army's AI CO.

"Unfortunately, we have to go all the way back to where we started." Leon pointed out to everyone. "But at least we don't have to walk the same path. I saw an elevator close to where we landed earlier."

...

Not too long after the Mercenaries begin their trek through the cargo holds, they came across a Rebel Soldier and Ptolemaic Guerilla chatting with each other about something, while a Ptolemaic Special Force Trooper stood behind them is laughing at whatever they may be talking about.

Before the Mercenaries can do anything, the Guerilla and Special Force Trooper instantly noticed them, whipped out their guns and started shooting. It took the Rebel Soldier a second to notice the Red Eagles and Marines, and he just bailed after having a moment of freak-out.

Funnily enough, the Guerilla and Special Force Trooper's shots missed the Mercenaries entirely, even though they were supposed to be better at everything than the Rebel Army.

"I don't even need to lampshade this trope..." Ash deadpanned about it before he gunned down both enemies with his handgun.

...

The Red Eagles and Marines soon came across a group of RAP troops consisting of a Melty Honey, Ptolemaic Motorcycle and a Future Girida-O that had somehow found its way on top of a pile of shipping containers.

"Another day, another bunch of morons to tear apart..." Flynn said as he fires his handgun at the drivers of the Melty Honey and Ptolemaic Motorcycle, killing both of them via headshot before they can do anything.

The Future Girida-O responds by firing five plasma shells at the Mercenaries.

This time, the shots came very close to actually hitting the Mercenaries, as they ducked behind the shipping containers at the last minute to avoid being hit.

"Close call!" Jason shouted out.

Flynn holstered his handgun, "Not on my watch, time travelers!" before jumping out of cover and making a mad dash toward the Future Girida-O.

The AI-controlled mini-tank only managed one more shot - which Flynn dodges by sliding under it - before the Marine punched it with such a powerful force that, although the hull is hardly dented, the kinetic energy transferred caused the Future Girida-O to flip over. Unable to right itself back up, the AI-controlled mini-tank soon shuts itself down, as though giving up.

"Universal weakness of tanks..." Flynn quipped while cracking his fists. "They become sitting ducks if you flip them upside down."

The Future Girida-O suddenly explodes without warning, laving behind a **Laser Gun**. Flynn was hardly fazed by the explosion, but he did jump in surprise afterwards.

"Okay, boys, don't be surprised..." Jenny said to the men, as she emerged from cover...and then turns around to shove her Taser right into the face of a Future Rebel Soldier that came out of nowhere, stunning him instantly. "...Just remember to keep an eye out for anyone who attempts to jump on us."

...

Two Rebel Soldiers stood on top of a shipping container, having a conversation with each other as opposed to patrolling this part of the cargo holds.

"And so that guy proclaimed 'I'll take this potato chip... AND EAT IT!' before he simply bites down on that piece. Waste of effort, I know, but it looked cool to him." One Rebel Soldier said.

"Oh, wait, I got one! How about... 'EPIC LIGHT BULB CHANGING!' Also a waste of effort, but also looked cool." The other Rebel Soldier replied and mimicked a pose that was best described as changing light bulbs while dodging machine gun fires simultaneously.

The two Rebel Soldiers then laughed out loud, with their laugh echoing all over the cargo holds.

"Then what about something much simpler, like running away?" A third voice chimed in.

"Running away? Well..." The Rebel Soldiers responded, before realizing something crucial. "Wait, who said that?!"

The Rebel Soldiers turned toward an Ammo Box, which Ash is stepping on with one feet and the other feet on the floor, while holding his Chainsaw in one hand and figuratively chewing the scenery. The Chainsaw is also revving loudly.

The two Rebel Soldiers dropped their jaws and just stood there for a few seconds before they both freaked out and ran away without a fight.

Mina lightly slapped Ash on the back of his head in response. "Ash-_kun_, there is no way you can ham it up as much as Light Yagami..."

The Chainsaw-totting mercenary put his foot down from the Ammo Box. "Aw, man. And I thought I was channeling Keith David, or Norio Wakamoto..." He then brings his Chainsaw down on the Ammo Box, splitting it in half.

The Ammo Box contained a **Shotgun**, which Leon snatched up before anyone else could. "This is my kind of weapon, so I should be the one having it." The Chinese-American Marine said.

One of the nearby shipping containers suddenly falls apart to reveal an Armored Unit (which is technically just a Gunner Unit reinforced with a spiky titanium facemask) that then fires a single missile from its hands at the Mercenaries.

Leon simply shoots down that missile with a well-timed **Shotgun** blast. Flynn then fires his **Laser Gun** at the Armored Unit until its spiky facemask and eventually its real face was melted all the way through by the beam.

"So, what's next?" Flynn said as he rests the **Laser Gun** over his shoulder.

A Claw Unit suddenly appears from behind the Marine and slams right through him, knocking him several feet away.

"Ouch..." Jason, Ash and Jenny commented in unison upon seeing the ambush attack.

Flynn got up without much of a scratch, and he seems very angry about being ambushed. "You want this? You'll get it!" The Marine dares the Claw Unit to launch another attack on him.

The Claw Unit (sort of) respond by lunging at Flynn with its clawed arms raised above it.

Flynn then lands a Berserker Punch on the Claw Unit before it can bring down its clawed arms, which pretty much shattered it into several pieces of scrap metals and broken circuit boards. "I'm the Juggernaut, bitch!"

Jason jumped in without giving any advanced warnings, and Vulcan Chopped a MG Unit that jumped out from behind another shipping container. "You missed one." The red-clad Red Eagle mercenary said to the Marine.

...

Location: Submarine Deployment Pen, KMI cargo ship "_Orochi_".

"You don't see this kind of setup very often, but I do know that this is where undersea vehicles like the Slug Mariners can be deployed in the middle of the ocean."

Jenny pointed out as the Red Eagles and the Marines approached the exact center of the _Orochi_'s cargo holds, where several Slug Mariners were hung by mini-cranes above an opening on the bottom of the ship that led to the surface of the Indian Ocean itself. As the opening was as wide as the cargo ship, a metal walkway with guardrails is held in between the un-deployed Slug Mariners, with metal struts extending from the port and starboard side hulls holding it in place, so that people can cross the gap without having to jump very high or swim in ocean water.

"Let's hope we won't be needing the Slug Mariners when either of those two big subs shows up." Ash shrugged while looking at the opening on the floor.

The walkway was connected to the floors on either side by extendable stairs that were extended at the moment, which the Mercenaries climbs up.

The walkway creaked slightly as the Mercenaries trotted over it, as would any metallic walkways.

Mina peered over the guardrails down at the opening on the bottom of the ship. The contained surface of the Indian Ocean, despite being calm, still gave the Japanese mercenary girl the creeps.

"Do you think there are any Great White Sharks down there?" Mina asked the others.

"I don't think they have any Great Whites in the Indian Oceans, girl." Ash was the one replying without turning around.

Mina kept her sights focused on the contained ocean surface below the walkway for a short while longer.

But then, something in the opening caught her eyes.

"There's something down there." Mina told the others as she pointed a finger at the contained ocean surface.

The other Mercenaries, having noticed something is amiss about their current location, stopped in their tracks and peered over the guardrails.

"Could be just a whale..." Jason reassured, having seen nothing noteworthy down there.

And then that reassuring became moot, as something emerged from the opening with a huge splash.

"Oh, come on... Battle stations!" Flynn cursed and called out as he gets prepared for the ensuing battle.

**Boss Battle: _Hozmi_.**

The Hozmi, with its signature dome on its back came out of the opening, and there's no doubt its crew plans to take out the Mercenaries if not the _Orochi_ itself. The first attack of the submarine was to reveal the Plasma Cannon under that dome and fire a plasma ball at the opposite end of the walkway, denying the Mercenaries an escape route.

"Okay, guess there's no avoiding this son of a bitch now." Jason said as he throws a Grenade at the Hozmi.

The Hozmi took that Grenade straight to its Plasma Cannon, but all it did was chipping the paint off. The submarine then returns fire with a volley of plasma ball.

The original Hozmi which was fought by the Peregrine Falcons and SPARROWS in the sewers of New Godokin City procrastinated occasionally, which gave the Regular Commandos ample time to recover and shoot it up. Not only does the one fought by the Mercenaries not procrastinate for even a second, it is also a lot more aggressive with its attacks, firing aimed plasma balls and un-aimed spread of plasma balls at the same time at a very fast rate.

The Red Eagles and Marines had to throw all of their Grenades at the Hozmi while jumping around like mad to dodge the volley of plasma balls. Because there were so much shots, the Mercenaries were grazed by them here and there. Not only that, the best their Grenade spam did against the submarine was deforming its hull without affecting its performance.

"Oh, come on! Even the strongest things I've fought in my past tours of duties weren't this tough!" Flynn complained about the resilience of the Hozmi.

The Hozmi then stops firing plasma balls as it closes the dome, from which a pair of gun barrels somehow extended from it. The gun barrels began making an ominous sound as they charged a powerful shot.

"I'm definitely not going to touch that!" Ash called out.

"Me neither!" Jenny agrees.

The Red Eagles and Mercenaries jumped out of the way as the Hozmi fired its double-barreled beam cannon, which quite literally sublimated an entire Slug Mariner (giving it no chance to self-destruct), part of the guardrails of the walkway, and the ceiling of the cargo hold. The beam had burned all the way through the ship's deck into the skies.

"That thing had made Tani-Oh and Kaladgolg look like weaklings in comparison..." Jenny paled at seeing what the Hozmi can do.

"There must be something we can do..." Leon said. He had emptied every single shell of his **Shotgun** into the Hozmi but so far did no significant damage. The Chinese-American Marine looked at one of the remaining Slug Mariners, and an idea bulb immediately flashed in his mind.

Flynn notices what his colleague is thinking about. "Better make this quick, brother, because the RAPs inside this thing ain't gonna wait for you." The Marine said as he narrowly avoids a plasma ball that was aimed straight at him.

Leon said nothing as he hopped onto one of the un-deployed Slug Mariners. He then leans down and extended his hands toward the cockpit of the Slug Mariner...

...And pulls the handle that activates its Slug Charge sequence.

"Ash, I need your Chainsaw here!" Leon called out.

Ash knew what Leon planned in his mind, and complies. "You just need to get out of the way first, buddy!" The grey-clad Red Eagle then lunges toward the self-destructing Slug Mariner as Leon quickly evacuated from it, and slices off the chains that hung it above the contained ocean surface.

The self-destructing Slug Mariner plunged toward the Hozmi. As the small sub made contact with the large submarine, the former went off in a deafening bang, which was powerful enough to dislodge an entire section of the Hozmi's upper hull.

The Red Eagles took note of the effectiveness of Leon's idea. After dodging another volley of plasma balls, Jason, Jenny, Ash and Mina nodded to each other, thinking of exactly one thing.

"Well, never thought we'll have to Slug Charge so many Slug vehicles at the same time." Jason took one short moment to point out the fact, and hangs a lamp on it.

The Mercenaries then went to all use the same attack against the Hozmi: purposefully activating the Slug Charge sequence of the un-deployed Slug Mariners and then releasing them onto the large submarine by cutting or shooting off the chains hanging the small subs.

Each of the self-destructing Slug Mariners, upon making contact with the Hozmi, went off in large explosions that tore off entire sections of the latter's hulls.

The Hozmi, in critical condition, attempted a last hurrah by deploying its double-barreled beam cannon and aimed it at the last un-deployed Slug Mariner.

"Don't even think about it!" Jason shouted as he jumped onto that Slug Mariner, activated its Slug Charge sequence, sliced the chains off with his Machete, and then jumping back onto the walkway just in time to avoid the metal-sublimating beam.

The last Slug Mariner crashed into the Hozmi with a deafening explosion. This was the last straw for the large submarine, as another explosion simultaneously occurred inside it that popped the Plasma Cannon right off its socket. Jets of water on its side indicates that the Hozmi had sustained enough damage to start taking in water inside, which forced the Rebel Soldiers, Amadeus Syndicalist and Ptolemaic Guerillas crewing it to commence an emergency evacuation, as they all jumped into the contained ocean surface, and tried their best to swim away as the Hozmi started sinking.

_**Hozmi**_** defeated.**

Having enough of what they've just went through, the crews of the Hozmi ran away from the scene as soon as they got themselves out of the water. One of the Rebel Soldiers didn't make it as he gets chewed up by a shark that came out of nowhere. Said shark proceeds to spit out his bones afterwards.

The Mercenaries shrugged at the fate of that unfortunate Rebel Soldier. "Ouch... Just like Allen when he got swallowed by that killer whale, and somehow came back alive..."

...

Location: Cargo Holds, KMI cargo ship "_Orochi_".

After the ordeal with the Hozmi, the Mercenaries left the Submarine Deployment Pen as quickly as they can run.

The first thing they run into is a bunch of Pirates whom takes potshots at the Mercenaries with their flintlock pistols. As usual, they missed by a large margin.

Flynn retaliates in behalf of his colleagues by sweeping over the Pirates with his **Laser Gun**.

As soon as the Pirates went down, more arrived at the scene to mob the Mercenaries.

"Good thing Pirates are usually stupid." Ash throws in a comment as he beheads a Pirate Fighter with his Chainsaw.

Leon took out a Pirate Fighter with a move that was quite similar to Clark Still's Super Argentine Backbreaker. The Pirate Fighter that was thrown several feet into the air landed back on the floor with a sickening crunch signifying the breaking of bones. The Chinese-American Marine proceeds to toss around every other Pirates that dare approaches him.

A Pirate got the jump on Leon, and was about to stab him when a laser beam tore through that Pirate's head, killing him on the spot.

"Watch your back, buddy." Flynn told Leon, pointing his **Laser Gun** at where the Pirate was a second ago.

The Mercenaries made short work of the Pirates with their combined firepower.

"Well, that wasn't too hard..." Flynn commented. "But if there's anything we've learned from our past missions, its that things never stay easy."

The Mercenaries continued trekking through the cargo holds. Sure enough, they soon came before a group of enemies. Said group consists of a Ptolemaic Commander standing on top of a Ptolemaic Sarubia. The Commander called forth a squadron of Hover Units (manned by Special Force Troopers rather than Guerillas) that were easily shot down by the Mercenaries (though a few did manage to release their missiles before being shot down, which were also shot out of the air). The Special Force Troopers that bailed out of destroyed Hover Units lunged at the Mercenaries, only to find themselves landing face-first into the business end of Jason's Vulcan Chop.

This Commander, rather than freaking out and escaping, had chose to jump down from the Ptolemaic Sarubia and fights the Mercenaries directly.

Hitting the Commando was quite difficult due to his agile movement and the occasional potshots he takes with his pistol, plus the Ptolemaic Sarubia launching rolling mines that forced the Mercenaries to jump in order to avoid. It took a while, but they managed to take out that Commander, and proceed to make short work of the Ptolemaic Sarubia which was more fragile than a Rebel Sarubia.

"Trading one strength for another. I guess it wasn't so practical when the strength traded is toughness." Mina throws in an offhand comment.

Another Ptolemaic Sarubia/ Commander combo appeared from behind the Mercenaries. This one summoned a swarm of Special Force Bikers that rode their bomb-laden bikes on wheelies before jumping off and sending the bikes somersaulting into the air.

The Red Eagles chose to play it safe by standing back and letting the bomb-laden bikes miss them. The Mercenaries chose to actively shoot the bikes out of the air, with Flynn using up the ammo of his **Laser Gun** to blow up the Special Force Bikers that haven't launched their bikes.

Sitting on a bike as it was blown up proved to be fatal, as demonstrated by the Special Force Bikers being lit aflame when their bomb-laden bikes blew up while still riding them.

The Commander was shot dead by the Mercenaries before he could start attacking them directly. They made short work of the Ptolemaic Sarubia afterwards.

...

As the Mercenaries continued, they ran into an unoccupied Forklift parked right there.

"Maybe we could use that." Ash pointed out.

That said, a Ptolemaic Bradley and Ptolemaic Girida-O appeared slightly further down the cargo holds, and started firing on the Mercenaries.

The Mercenaries simply hides behind the shipping containers since those were apparently strong enough to resist artillery strikes. They then return fire and blows up the Ptolemaic Bradley first.

Flynn charged toward the Ptolemaic Girida-O and landed a Berserk Punch on it. The turret was knocked loose from the chassis before both halves of the mini-tank exploded. "I love my own fists." The Marine said.

An MG Unit that came from behind got the jump on the Mercenaries, as it fired its Gatling Guns at them without warning.

Luckily, the Mercenaries noticed it in time, and jumped out of the trajectory of the bullets.

Ash had the idea to jump onto the Forklift, start up its engines, and then backing the industrial vehicle all the way back, hitting the MG Unit hard enough to have dislodged major internal circuitry as it became inactive afterwards.

"Road kill! Okay, not exactly ran over, but you don't usually get to knock robots out by driving a vehicle into them." The grey-clad Red Eagle joked. He then notices that he was holding onto a lever that would've activated something he doesn't plan to activate at the moment, so he quickly let go of it. "Now which KMI employee has the idea of putting a Slug Charge function on a Forklift?"

"I think only KMI has the answer to that." Mina added.

...

After that section with the MG Unit ambushing them, the Red Eagles and Marines' trek through the cargo holds can be best summarized as piles upon piles of dead Rebel Soldiers, Amadeus Syndicalist, Ptolemaic infantries and Future Rebel Soldiers, with the occasional wrecked LV Armor, Patrol Robots, Supervisory Cameras, Ptolemaic Slugs, Rebel Walkers and anything else that isn't a human.

As the Mercenaries reached the elevator mention earlier, it was guarded by a Metal Claw (the Regular Army's Melty Honey variant) that was hijacked by an Amadeus Syndicalist. As the driver of the Metal Claw was concealed under the hull - unlike a standard Melty Honey - the Red Eagles and Marines' only way of stopping it was to destroy it, which Ash does by spearing the Metal Claw with the fork of the Forklift.

With that done, the Mercenaries made their way into the elevator, having enough of getting mobbed by RAP troops every few seconds.

...

Location: Stern Deck, KMI cargo ship "_Orochi_"

The Red Eagles stepped out of the elevator, and breathed a sigh of relief after everything they've went through in the cargo holds.

"Let's not talk about the Hozmi, okay?" Jason said as he lied down on the deck floor.

The Marines doesn't seem fatigued one bit. Then again, every other US Marines operating in the other parts of the world faced something just as bad every day.

"Good thing our transport arrived just in time." Leon pointed at the familiar shape and hue of the Regular Hi-Do descending upon the stern deck.

As the Red Eagles were much too fatigued by the earlier ordeals, it was Flynn who waved at the Regular Hi-Do to tell the pilot that the Mercenaries are ready to leave.

"Wait..." Jenny realized something. "Regular Command mentioned _two_ big submarines, right?" The blue-haired Red Eagle got up immediately. "The Hozmi makes one, so where's the other one?"

As soon as Jenny finishes her statement, a huge explosion erupted from the starboard side that rocked the entire cargo ship.

The sound of the huge explosion made the pilot of the Regular Hi-Do exclaim _"Holy shit!"_ as he maneuvered the transport helicopter away from the deck by accident. The explosions also jolted the other Red Eagles awake.

"Damn... Can't believe we overlooked the other bastard..."

...

A second explosion erupted that pretty much broke the _Orochi_ into several pieces, which then sinks toward the bottom of the Indian Ocean. The only part of the cargo ship that is still floating above water is the stern, which the Mercenaries had managed to hang on to.

A large jet black submarine then emerges next to the broken off stern. What looked like the emblem of the Amadeus Syndicate can be seen on one small section of the black sub's hull, half submerged.

**Boss Battle: _Sea Satan_.**

"We won't be able to get back to dry land unless we sink this thing!" Ash shouted to the others.

All the Mercenaries nodded to each other before they start shooting at the Sea Satan.

Like the original Sea Satan, this version has only two sets of weapons: a manned turret equipped with a Gatling gun and twin missile launchers, and four ICBM launch tubes. Unlike the original one, the Gatling gun fired anti-tank rounds that pierced through the broken off stern (just like the ones from the upgraded versions of Tani-Oh and Kaladgolg), the twin missiles have much more unpredictable flight patterns, the former two being used at the same time, and the ICBMs having been shrunken down to anti-personnel missile size. The lack of a Bura Gariae airship providing support fire also meant that this version of Sea Satan is much more aggressive with its attacks.

_"You might need this!"_ The Regular Hi-Do pilot told the Mercenaries through the on-board intercoms before airdropping a Slug Vehicle Crate onto the broken off stern, which opened itself up to reveal a Slugnoid.

"Thanks!" Jason said to the pilot as he goes to man the Slugnoid and fires its twin Vulcans at the Sea Satan, at the same time shooting down any missiles that are fired at him and his colleagues.

The hatch of the submarine unlocked from the inside, and one Ptolemaic Special Force Trooper after another came out of it to attack the Mercenaries.

"Get off this ship! There isn't enough room for all of us!" Ash shouted at the Special Force Troopers as he shot and slashed at each and every one that attempts to board the broken off stern.

One of the Special Force Troopers had managed to climb up the stern from the opposite end. He was about to stab Leon in the back when the Chinese-American Marine suddenly turns around, and tossed him straight into the ocean via his version of Super Argentine Backbreaker.

Moments later, the Special Force Troopers stopped coming, and the hatch somehow closes on its own. The manned turret also retracts at the same time, indicating that the Sea Satan is about to dive.

"I just noticed... That guy manning the turret was somehow immune to everything we threw at him." Jason took the opportunity to point out.

"Must be some kind of phase shield... whatever its called that also made Morden immune to everything the Regular Commandos threw at him at the Time Portal Control Room in Garbage Island." Jenny tries to explain.

As the Sea Satan dived slightly deeper, it started launching anti-personnel missiles from its ICBM tubes in large numbers. There were so many missiles that even the Slugnoid's twin Vulcans were having trouble getting to all of them.

One of those missiles eventually went through, and hit the Slugnoid directly, dislodging one of its Vulcans in the process. Jason was unhurt, merely frowning at the thought that the Slugnoid is so fragile.

"Someone should make this thing more resistant to damage..." Flynn comments on the fragility of the Slugnoid.

Very soon, the Sea Satan runs out of anti-personnel missiles to fire at the Mercenaries. As the crews begin reloading the ICBM tubes, the submarine surfaces again, and redeploys the manned turret to take potshots at the Mercenaries. The hatch also popped open to deploy more Special Force Troopers.

Jason took the chance to maneuver the Slugnoid so that it is directly above the hatch. "Eat this, you son of a bitch!" The red-clad Red Eagle taunted loudly as he fires a single cannon shell down the hatch.

That cannon shell ripped through the Special Force Troopers that were attempting to climb up the hatch, and then exploded as it reached the bottom of the hatch.

The shell must've hit something major to cause many parts of the Sea Satan's outer hull to blast out tiny jets of flames which indicates an explosion being contained, with most of the flames coming out of the manned turret, incinerating the Rebel Soldier manning it.

_**Sea Satan**_** defeated.**

"That's it?" Flynn asked the others. "This is the most fragile attack submarine I've ever seen..."

Jason fired a few more Vulcan rounds from the Slugnoid at the Sea Satan to make sure it was really defeated. The jet black submarine's ballast systems not failing the slightest bit made everyone wonder why it hasn't started to sink despite the damage it took.

"Finally, all clear..."

**MISSION COMPLETE!**

...

Time: 0845 Hour.

Location: On board the Regular Hi-Do, somewhere over the Indian Ocean.

After having spent the last three hours or so on board the _Orochi_, the Red Eagles and Marines were glad to be sitting inside an aircraft.

"Boy, was the KMI going to be pissed about this..." Ash pointed out to the others. "Let's hope the company doesn't demand us to pay for the damage..."

"So, where are we heading for now?" Jason asked.

Jenny checked the current heading of the Regular Hi-Do with a handheld GPS system. "Looks like somewhere in the Arabian Peninsula. I hope the reason for us being sent there has nothing to do with ISIS..."

Mina, who was taking the free time to wipe the blood of RAP Joint Force troops from her katana with a piece of cloth, said, "I don't think ISIS have reached the Arabian Peninsula yet..."

Leon showed the Red Eagles a photo. Said photo was taken in a desert at midnight, so everything in it are concealed by the shadows and only slightly lit by the moonlight of that time, but there's no mistaking that the sole person in the photo is another person that has already been encountered by the Regular Commandos. "Apparently, one of Morden's old friends, Abbul Abbas was back in action, and he's leading another revolution against the Saudi government, this time with help from all of the RAP Joint Force, not just the present-day Rebel Army."

"And as you can see in this photo..." Flynn pointed his finger at the two colossal constructs behind Abbul Abbas in the photo. "They gave him some new toys to blow shits up with. The Regular Commandos have already fought the original version of that small one, but its the really big one that even I am worried about..."

The smallest of the colossal constructs has the shape of a submarine, which gave away the fact that it was the Ptolemaic Army's Sandmarine. However, the huge one, which seemed to dwarf even Big Shiee in comparison is not identifiable.

"Even I think that beating the huge one will rely on a truckload of luck and heavy artillery..." Flynn told everyone present.

Hearing the unstoppable Marine saying that something has the potential to stop him made the Red Eagles swallow hard and sweat-dropped.

* * *

**Afterwords**

Okay, that wraps up the shenanigans on board the _Orochi_. Next time on _Metal Slug: Mercenaries_, we'll be seeing Abbul Abbas taking on the Mercenaries with the infamous Sandmarine, and something that doesn't seem to be in any official _Metal Slug_ games.

To Soldier Of The Future: don't be surprised that I gave Leon Chan the ability to perform a faux Super Argentine Backbreaker. I looked at his profile in _Metal Slugopedia_ and thought that his skillset wouldn't do him any justice if _Metal Slug: Mercenaries_ was an actual video game, and since I wrote _MSM_ while treating it like actual gameplay...

Upgrades given to the bosses:

Hozmi: shoots faster, shoots more plasma balls at the same time, and much more aggressive with its attack, unlike the original one which occasionally procrastinated.

Sea Satan: again, much more aggressive with its attacks, with the ICBMs having been replaced with homing anti-personnel missiles. The manned turret also fires both of its weapons at the same time, rather than just one at a time. Interesting enough, there's also a pseudo-downgrade in that this version isn't supported by a Bura Gariae airship (first boss of _Metal Slug 4_).

Also, Ver 1.36 for _Metal Slug Defense_ came out just as I was finishing this chapter. I'll be summarizing the update's highlights.

Red Tarman and Zombies Eri, Tarma and Fio: Those guys are back. Last time we saw them was during the Summer Night Horror Event, which was around the time I lost one year worth of progress on the game. Looks like they're not free anymore. *Sigh*

Halloween Soldier: This guy? Since he showed up at the shop, I thought he was going to be a very powerful unit that costs a lot of Medals. Turns out: he cost zero Medals, so he's essentially a free unit. He's also a kamikaze unit, not a continuously attacking one, and to be honest, seems like just a palate swap of the Rebel Zombie. He's also aligned with the Rebel Army instead of the Aliens (which the other zombies were).

Sandmarine: Few people noticed this, but looks like this bastard has been nerfed a little bit. Before Ver 1.36, its homing electric balls can travel much farther than the Sandmarine can see, even able to home in on your base all the way from the opposite end of the map. Now, the electric balls seems to sink closer to the ground as they homed in on to their target and eventually impacting the ground, which means the Sandmarine can no longer shoot your base until to gets close enough. Also, SNK has apparently adopted the name "Sandmarine" which was originally just a fan nickname (the description of Mission 155 was in their own words "Destroy! 'SANDMARINE'")

Big Shiee: Yes, you read that right, freaking **_BIG SHIEE_** is now playable! Expect to see it a lot in WiFi Versus from this point on! If you haven't gotten the Kessi II yet, I suggest that you get it ASAP!

Hozmi: I found this quite amusing. Here I was writing about Hozmi, and then BANG! Hozmi is in MSD! This thing is quite similar to Tani-Oh in that none of your units will attack it directly and just walks over it. Unlike Tani-Oh, Hozmi can be hit by any attacks that are executed above it (even the Metal Slug Attack), as its hitbox extends slightly above ground. Big problem: Hozmi can actually attack your base, unlike Tani-Oh which just sits in the middle of the map. Hozmi's Special Attack is also _insanely powerful_, so much that even units with 25K HP like the Slug Gigant is guaranteed to get killed if it comes in contact with that beam.

Dangling Mutated Soldier: I know they only appear in that limited time new stage, but FUCK THESE BASTARDS! Why? Because of their attacks! Whose idea is it to make the animation of them dropping down from the ceiling _also deal damage_?! Also, if the Metal Slug Attack collides with one as it drops down, the MSA is stopped by it! What the hell, SNK?!

That concludes the Ver 1.36 summary.

Shout-out index:

"...'I'll take this potato chip... AND EAT IT!'..." - _Death Note_ proves that you can make something as simple as eating potato chips look awesome.

"...'EPIC LIGHT BULB CHANGING!'..." - from an Anime called _Muteki Kanban Musume_... Not really, its the page image for the Anime section of the Mundane Made Awesome trope page on TVTropes.

"...there's no way you can ham it up as much as Light Yagami..." - Yes, Ash. Like your girlfriend Mina said, you're better off channeling an American. Leave large ham Japanese for someone else...

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	11. Chapter 10: Desert Navy

**Forewords**

COIN SHOWER!

That's my summary for _Metal Slug Defense_ Ver 1.37 and 1.38. This update gave us a new Event.

Unlike the previous Events though, the enemy base in these stages are _completely immune to damage_! Even that Metal Rear in Event Stage 2-4! You'll have to survive until the enemy base - which was replaced with what I call a Treasure Totem -self-destructs.

The craziest stage in this Event is probably Event Stage 4-4. Holy crap! Berserk Sol Dae Rokker makes it so that you are forced to use specific units to be able to win it! Not "specific kind of units"! _Specific units_! Berserk Sol Dae Rokker plus super-short map equals HARDEST STAGE IN MSD EVER!

Additionally, I was expecting the Sandmarine, which became playable in this update, to be able to change the PVP meta. But nope! She's useless even in Single-Player. Here's why: the size, too big = more damage from Big Shiee and Kessi II; movement speed, your frontlines would already be toast by the time she gets there; attack speed, too slow = not good at crowd controls... The only thing she's useful for is shooting down Kessi II, and even then, she won't live long afterwards anyway...

Fighting Sandmarine in _Metal Slug 5_: "Holy shit! How do you beat this thing without taking a hit?!"

Sandmarine in _MSD_'s MSD Max Event: "Oh FUUUU! Sandmarine is back!"

Sandmarine in Sleeping Gigantic Weapon Event Stage 5: "Normal stage is still a bit hard. Hard stage is slightly harder. Hell stage... Oh god! Tank rush!"

Sandmarine becomes playable in Ver 1.37: "Meh, this little girl is now useless thanks to Big Shiee, Kessi II, and her being nerfed too much..."

So if you decide to buy Sandmarine from the Event Shop, expect her to only be used as a collector's item like the Battle Cats from Ver 1.34 and 1.35. At least the Cats were useful in Event Stage 4-4 for distracting Berserk Sol Dae Rokker... Better save your Coins for Allen O'Neil (Wrath) and Amadeus's computers...

Oh, looks like Dai-Manji, Regular Army Helicopter and Gen Morden Ver Di-Cokka are back, this time buyable in the Event Shop. If you missed them in the past updates, now's the time to get them back. I plan to do so because of that darned lost one-year worth of progress.

Finally, it looks like the AI is now programmed to be able to deploy Builders to place stationary units such as Mummy Generators and Big John. That was quite surprising to me at first, because the only time I've seen the AI deploying a Builder is in Mission 2, and that one builds a Sandbag.

And... Still no Kraken...

* * *

**Chapter 10: Desert Navy**

Time: 1130 Hour; 31st of December, 2040.

Location: Near United Arab Emirates border; Saudi Arabia.

"Okay, here's the latest updates on the upcoming mission." The Marines briefed the Red Eagles as the transport helicopter hovered above their destination. "Abbul Abbas and his troops were last seen somewhere around here: the border between Saudi Arabia and the UAE."

"And there's no questioning he'll be bringing the Sandmarine and that giant one along..." Jenny pointed out to everyone.

Upon the "giant one" being mentioned, the males of the Mercenaries dropped cold sweat.

"Considering that the original Sandmarine is already difficult to deal with, we sure don't want to know what upgrades might be given to it..." Ash summed up his opinion to everyone present.

...

**_Mission briefing_**

_Kanegawa Military Industries is angry, alright. But not about your failure to prevent the _Orochi_ from being sunk, but rather the RAP Joint Force having the idea to sink another one of their shipment of Slug vehicle prototypes again._

_Back on topic. As you were already told, Abbul Abbas and his revolutionaries are back in action again. This time, the Arabian warlord has set his attention on the UAE, with assistance from not just the Rebel Army but the Amadeus Syndicate and Ptolemaic Army as well. This is the crucial point, as the KMI has an offshore facility located between the maritime borders of the UAE and Qatar. Said facility has a land-based secret entrance located in the UAE, and our intelligence has calculated that the current trajectories of the revolutionaries will take them straight to it. This is most definitely not a coincidence despite the hidden nature of said entrance._

_Your objectives is to at least delay Abbul Abbas and his troops from reaching the secret entrance until Regular Army reinforcements arrives. Do thin out the revolutionaries' artilleries so that the reinforcements can take them down without too much trouble._

_You may have already noticed the fact that Abbul Abbas was given the Sandmarine and a massive construct. The SPARROWS Intelligence Unit have absolutely no way to identify the latter due to it possibly having wavelength disruptors, so you are on your own if the warlord decides to sic it on you._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

**MISSION NINE START!**

The Red Eagles and Marines starts off their current mission with another successful HAHO jump. Only this time, a Ptolemaic Flying Tara just so happened to fly by the Mercenaries as they were slowly descending down. Although the small jet-propelled flying wing did not fire upon the Mercenaries, there's no doubt it has alerted the RAP Joint Forces of their arrival.

"Why can't we ever sneak around Solid Snake style...?" Jason lampshaded as he landed on the Arabian desert sand alongside his friends.

"Maybe because its bone dry in the places we end up in?" Ash joked. "Sneaking missions are called 'wet works' after all..." then laughs in a proud manner.

"I know you're trying to make a pun, Ash-_kun_." Mina cuts in. "Although it isn't a bad one, it is sort of paradoxical when you bring our previous mission to mind."

The chainsaw-totting Mercenary's proud laugh soon turned into an embarrassment-fueled one, as he ruffles his own hair.

...

The Red Eagles and Marines hid behind a sand hill as they watched from behind cover what their targets are currently up to.

"Looks like we landed just in time to catch them during one of their pit stops." Leon pointed out. "Although there is no questioning that they will be preparing for a firefight with us..."

"Normally, I would've just ran straight toward them, guns blazing as I blow shits up." Flynn said to the others. "But not this time, 'cause I'm still worried of that unidentifiable colossal from the photo..."

The Mercenaries then turns their attention back on observing the Arabian Revolutionaries. The SPARROWS' intel was right, the Revolutionaries were supplied with heavy artilleries from both the Amadeus Syndicate and Ptolemaic Army as well, not just the Rebel Army.

Even the Future Rebels seemed to be present, as one of the Ptolemaic Landseeks can be seen carrying a Rebel Bradley that is painted cyan - perhaps a Future Bradley.

"Now that's what I would call 'armed to the teeth'." Jenny comments on the firepower of the RAPs.

All of a sudden, a Ptolemaic Hover Vehicle appeared from behind the Mercenaries and fired its anti-tank machine gun at them.

"Holy...!" Caught by surprise, the Mercenaries barely manages to evade the cheap shots before they fired back at the Hover Vehicle.

The Hover Vehicle wasn't so tough, as it went down after just a few handgun hits taken by its engines.

"I got the feeling that they have more of those waiting for us elsewhere..." Jason points out.

As if on cue, the Arabian Revolutionaries with their RAP-provided firepower started moving again, with a squadron of Flying Tara coming in from the skies and are flying toward the Mercenaries.

"This is the life of a soldier..." Flynn commented before he aims and fires his handgun at the approaching Flying Tara squadron.

...

For some reason, there were an endless stream of both Rebel and Ptolemaic Flying Tara constantly appearing from the skies to drop bombs and missiles on the Mercenaries as the Arabian Revolutionaries and RAPs made their getaway toward their destination.

"We're gonna need some more firepower!" Jason said as he shoots down a Rebel Flying Tara. "At this rate, Abbul Abbas and his men will get there before we can nail them!"

A Ptolemaic Flying Tara gets the jump on the Mercenaries and drops a missile straight above their heads.

"Heads up!" Flynn shouted at the others as he jumped into the air and Berserk Punched the missile so hard it shattered into pieces with no chance to detonate its payload. He then proceeds to shoot down the Ptolemaic Flying Tara.

Immediately afterwards, three MV-280C jeeps entered the scene, brandishing their fixed forward-facing machine guns.

All three jeeps only get to fire a few shots - none of which hits - before being shot up by the Mercenaries.

The Mercenaries then pushes forward amidst the endless bombardment coming from the squadron of Rebel and Ptolemaic Flying Tara. On the way, they encountered, and shot up hordes of RAP Joint Force troops and machineries as they dodges fires from enemy air support at the same time.

"Geez, one has to wonder how they get so much troops to join their clause..." Ash lampshaded as he looked back at the carnage everyone caused.

...

Moments later, the continuous airstrikes finally came to an end as the Flying Tara squadron stopped coming in from the skies.

"I guess they stopped once they realized such a level of airstrike makes friendly fire much more likely." Leon points out.

Two 3-Ton Utility Trucks then arrives on the scene, one in front of the Mercenaries, the other behind them. Both are carrying Arabian Fighters, who proceeds to pour out of the transport vehicles with their swords pointing forward.

"Really, these people are still using swords?" Jason makes an offhand comment as he punches an Arabian Fighter right in the face.

Despite them coming in a nearly endless stream, the Arabian Fighters weren't much troubles to deal with, as charging with their swords were the only form of attack they have. It didn't take too long before the Red Eagles manages to blow up both 3-Ton Utility Trucks with their firepower, while the Marines wiped out the remaining Arabian Fighters.

"These guys ought to learn some better ways to fight." Flynn sulked about the lack of challenges as of now.

The Mercenaries moved on, but soon came across a group of Arabian Soldiers that popped out from behind the sand hills with their swords raised. The Arabian Soldiers begin their ambush with a series of sword-throwing, but as those thrown swords weren't aimed, most of them fell short of the Mercenaries even if they just stood still.

When the Mercenaries retaliated, the Arabian Soldiers didn't even have the chance to replenish their swords as they took multiple handgun bullets to their bodies.

"Swords don't always work when your opponent have guns!" Jenny taunted the dead Arabian Soldiers afterwards.

Another short trek later, the Mercenaries encountered yet another party of Arabian Soldiers and Fighters, which they dispose of with ease.

Immediately after the enemies were disposed of, a Ptolemaic Landseek appears in front of the Mercenaries, carrying Abbul Abbas on its flatbed.

"There he goes!" Ash pointed at the Arabian warlord, before firing his handgun.

The bullets seemed to actively dodge Abbul Abbas as they all curved around him.

"You government apes need to learn when to give up." Abbul Abbas taunts Ash, and the Red Eagles and Marines in general in response to the failed shooting.

"Actually, we're not government soldiers..." Mina corrected, then points at Flynn and Leon. "These two men are."

"Doesn't matter." Abbul Abbas shot back. "You are still working as the enemy of my troops, and therefore my allies will stop you."

"And this is where he may start boasting like any stereotypical video game villain..." Jason butts in with an offhand comment.

Abbul Abbas waved his sword, a sign he uses to call for reinforcements. "Now witness the firepower which my newest allies have bestowed upon me."

As soon as the Arabian Warlord gave his signal, several Ptolemaic Guerilla Paratroopers descended from the skies, peppering the Mercenaries with large amounts of SMG fires.

Although the Guerilla Paratroopers' manic bullet spray makes dodging and shooting back difficult, the Red Eagles and Marines manages to last until they've taken out all the enemies.

"That's worth boasting about?" Flynn shoots his opinion toward Abbul Abbas's direction.

That expression on the Arabian warlord tipped off the Mercenaries that he probably have something else prepared.

"That was just how these Ptolemaic men tells their colleagues to get ready." Abbul Abbas said before he makes a getaway on the Ptolemaic Landseek he's hitching a ride on.

The Red Eagles and Mercenaries could only watch as the wheels of the Ptolemaic Landseek sprayed hot desert sand into their face.

"I have a feeling I know what's coming..." Jason swallowed hard, thinking of the firepower Abbul Abbas boasted about.

Within seconds, the ground below the Mercenaries' feet shook, the sands begin to bulge as something is emerging from it.

"Oh, crap..." Ash cursed, knowing what's coming from below the sands.

**BOSS BATTLE: _Sandmarine_.**

The Sandmarine, the same Ptolemaic war machine that the Regular Commandos have loads of trouble dealing with - or rather, its upgraded version - has arrived.

The Sandmarine starts off the battle a torrent of incendiary shells fired into the air which then rains back down upon its surroundings. The most infamous attack of the land-based submarine.

Only this time, it is also firing its homing electric balls at the same time despite none of the Mercenaries being behind it.

"I guess this is why the Regular Commandos made it a point to mention in their report that Sandmarine was the most annoying war machine they've ever fought!" The Red Eagles summed up how difficult it was to avoid getting hit by the barrage.

As soon as all the incendiary shells hit the floor, Flynn jumped in front of the Sandmarine, "Eat this!" and then landed a Berserk Punch on the tip of its stern.

The American Marine's punch that was known to be able to tear apart even the heaviest armor failed to even dent the Sandmarine.

"What?!" Flynn exclaimed in surprise.

In response to the failed Berserk Punch, the Sandmarine fires its frontal cannon in a burst of three shells.

Flynn and the other Mercenaries manages to jump out of the way, only to find that the cannon shells fragmented into flaming shrapnel after they exploded on the sandy ground.

"Well, there isn't anything else in the Sandmarine to be upgraded, so they decided to make it much more aggressive and trigger happy instead..." Jenny took the opportunity to point out as she lobbed her entire reserve of Grenades at the land-based sub.

The biggest problem with this upgraded version of Sandmarine is that it would fire all of its weapons at once whenever there's at least one Mercenary standing in front of it, and that's not mentioning the weapons themselves being upgraded.

The Sandmarine fires off another torrent of incendiary shells right before it dives below the sand.

"I'm going to tear apart whoever designed this hunk of metal monstrosity!" Ash shouted furiously as he tries his best at dodging the incendiary shells and homing electric balls.

In just a few seconds after the rain of incendiary shells stopped, the Sandmarine resurfaces and fires off another torrent.

"Just die already, you bastard!" Jason shouted as he does a series of Vulcan Chops on the land-based sub, with the incendiary shells conveniently missing him.

The hull of the Sandmarine begins to buckle after all the hits it had taken, but that does not hinder its capability in any way as it launches a pair of land-based torpedoes at the Mercenaries.

As the torpedoes have no homing capabilities, the Red Eagles dodged one torpedo by simply jumping over it, while the Marines shot up the other one with their handguns.

What the Marines didn't expect is that the torpedo still exploded with enough force to throw them both across the sandy desert ground.

"I've seen ordnances having more explosive powers than their size would suggest, but this one is more ridiculous than the ones back then!" Flynn said as he gets up on his feet, and then jumping back in time to evade an electric ball that was coming his way.

"We've had too much firepower from this thing! I say we sink it right away!" Jenny, furious about how overpowered the Sandmarine is, said angrily.

With that, the Mercenaries lobbed every Grenade they have at the land-based sub. One of the Grenades went straight into the frontal cannon just as it was about to fire a shell. The resulting explosion blew the frontal cannon and a small portion of its stern hull, exposing the internal components underneath.

"Now's the chance!" Leon called out, and directed everyone to aim and shoot for the exposed internals with their handguns.

The Sandmarine attempts to stop the Mercenaries by firing off another torrent of incendiary shells. However, as soon as it finishes firing the torrent, the bullets must've hit something very highly flammable (perhaps a coolant pipe), causing the whole of the land-based sub to explode from within.

As the Mercenaries navigates around the final torrent, some of the incendiary shells impacted the heavily damaged Sandmarine, crippling it to the poit that it had started to sink uncontrollably below the desert sand where it first popped out from.

**_Sandmarine_ defeated.**

The Red Eagles and Mercenaries took several steps back as the sinking of the Sandmarine triggered a big sinkhole that threatened to swallow them. Thankfully, the sinkhole stopped expanding in just ten seconds.

The Mercenaries peeked at the bottom of the sinkhole from the edge to check and see if the Sandmarine is out of commission. The land-based sub laid motionless in its sandy grave.

"Where's the crew?" Mina pointed out something. "Wouldn't they be at least attempting to evacuate?"

It was Jenny who replied to the Japanese girl. "According to the Regular Army, the original Sandmarine was found to be fully automated. So I guess its controlled either remotely or by its own AI..."

...

The Red Eagles and Marines moved on after the fight with the Sandmarine. They soon arrive at an abandoned Arabic town which the RAP Joint Force and Arabian Revolutionaries are stopping by for a pit stop, just in time to see something... enormous diving below the ground in a similar manner as the Sandmarine, leaving behind an equally huge sinkhole just outside the abandoned town.

"And that, kids, is the big one I'm worried about..." Flynn reminded the others as he pointed at the spot where the enormous construct had disappeared into.

"After everything they've went through for the past few years, I'm surprised that they still have enough resources to build all these hulking war machines." Jenny lampshaded.

"And I say we blast them with everything we got." Ash suggested to everyone.

...

So the Mercenaries went straight toward the abandoned town, gunning down every enemy that gets in their way.

The first bunch of enemies encountered were a bunch of Camel Riders supported by a squad of Regimental Masknell.

The Red Eagles easily dealt with the Camel Riders while the Mercenaries shot down the Regimental Masknell fairly quickly.

The Mercenaries moved on, and encountered a formation consisting of a M-150A Bradley and a 3-Ton Utility Truck from which an endless stream of Arabian Fighters emerges.

Both the Bradley and the 3-Ton Utility Truck were blown up after letting off just a few attacks, with the remaining Arabian Fighters swiftly beaten to a pulp by Jason and Flynn.

Three more R-Shobu - one of which is a red Elite - immediately arrives to drop bombs around the Mercenaries, which were easily dodged. The two normal variants were shot down just as they were preparing to fire missiles, the Elite R-Shobu which was more resistant to damage managed to fire off four missiles - which were also dodged by the Mercenaries - before being shot down as well.

"Get lost until you guys become more creative with your attacks..." Leon throws in an offhand comment in the wake of the carnage.

...

The Mercenaries moved on toward the next section of the abandoned village. It took just a few seconds before they were ambushed by Amadeus Syndicalists fast-roping down from above.

Most of the Syndicalists were shot dead before reaching the bottom of the rope. The few that does manage to land on the ground didn't get to take more than two steps before being stabbed to death by the Mercenaries. One of them did manage to catch Flynn by surprise and land a backstab on him, only to find his knife hitting what sounded like reinforced steel before the Marine turns around and Berserk Punched him into a literal pulp of mangled flesh.

"Good thing I still have my trusty armor." Flynn said as he wipes the blood off his hands.

The Mercenaries moved on, and soon encountered another bunch of Amadeus Syndicalists fast-roping down, along with some LV Armors jumping down from the roof of a nearby building. As the Amadeus Syndicate does not field their own mechanized units, these LV Armors are basically the same thing as what the Rebels uses.

The Syndicalists were easily dealt with. The LV Armors not so much, as they sprayed suppressive machine gun fire all over the place, making return fires much more difficult.

Although that difficulty was short lived when one of the LV Armor pilots decided to fire a sabot shell at the Mercenaries. They easily dodged it, and that short moment of decrease in suppressive fire allowed them to shoot back and take out all the LV Armors, some disabled by having their pilots killed, some damaged enough that they simply blew up.

"Baka..." Mina uttered in response to the mistakes made by the LV Armor pilots.

The Mercenaries moved on for a brief moment before two M-3 Rocket Launch Support Vans - one from in front and one from behind - suddenly appeared and boxed them in. The two artillery vans then proceed to fire a barrage of parachute bombs that then rains down from above over the Mercenaries.

"Well, good thing they left behind this Ammo Box." Jason sad as he kicks an Ammo Box open, revealing not what he wanted for the current situation. "A **Zantetsu Sword**? Okay, I take that back..." Frowning, he then proceeds to shoot out the parachute bombs with his handgun alongside his friends.

When the next barrage of parachute bombs came, there was a wide enough gap between the bombs for all six Mercenaries to stand still in without being hit. They took this opportunity to pepper one of the M-3 with handgun bullets, before Flynn moves in and Berserk Punched it into an exploding pile of wreckage that also somehow left behind a **Super Grenade** in its wake.

"Now this is what I need." Flynn picked up the **Super Grenade** and proceed to fire at the other M-3. It didn't take too much shot from the weapon before the artillery van blew up as well, this one leaving behind a **Shotgun**.

Leon immediately moves in and snatched the **Shotgun** from the wreckage. "My hands are sort of itching to make contact with another **Shotgun**, so I'll have it."

Mina picked up the **Zantetsu Sword** anyway. "For good measure..." She said.

...

The Mercenaries moved on, and encountered more enemies. This time, several Arabian Soldiers supported by a pair of Ptolemaic Girida-Os.

This time, things wasn't so easy anymore, as the Ptolemaic Girida-Os with their armors being tougher than their Rebel counterpart were resisting handgun bullets very well.

"Good thing you guys just got better firepower, right?" Ash said, right before Flynn and Leon uses their **Super Grenade** and **Shotgun** to blow off the turrets of the mini-tanks and then the Arabian Soldiers. The Marines each took a step back as a sword thrown by one of the Arabian Soldiers landed close to their feet.

The formation was almost immediately replaced by two 3-Ton Utility Trucks and two Ptolemaic Utility Vans boxing in the Mercenaries. The 3-Ton Utility Trucks were easily dealt with by the Marines' firepower. The Utility Vans were much more resistant to damage, each tanking several **Super Grenade** shells before blowing up. The Ptolemaic Special Force Troopers that emerged from the Utility Vans have the opportunity to row several rolling bombs toward the Mercenaries before being blown up themselves.

As the rolling bombs were somehow immune to damage, the Mercenaries chose to move around them instead. The rolling bombs blew up on their own shortly after the Mercenaries left them behind.

It wasn't very long before the Mercenaries encountered another formation. This one consisted of a Ptolemaic Sniper under a box and a Commander. The latter called in a fleet of Hover Units to launch missiles at the Mercenaries.

Dealing with the Hover Units wasn't a difficult feat. The problem being the Sniper occasionally firing shots with such precision the Mercenaries focused all of their attention on him just to avoid being hit. This allowed the Hover Units to release their missiles and then quickly make a getaway.

"Screw you, long range wannabe!" Flynn curses out loud before firing a **Super Grenade** shell at the Sniper, blowing both him and the nearby Commander (who was about to escape) into several pieces.

And then there's the missiles released by the Hover Units. Having been kept busy by the Sniper earlier, the Mercenaries have no opportunity to dodge any one of them. So they decided to shoot down as many as possible.

One missile impacted very close to Jason, knocking him off his feet as he face-planted the ground.

"Damn, that's one taste of sand I'll never forget..." The Red Eagle leader said as he gets up...

...Just in time to catch glimpse of a Ptolemaic Bradley and Combat Motorbike (a Special Force Motorbike with a portable missile launcher in its sidecar) arriving. The two Ptolemaic units made no delay in firing their payloads at the Mercenaries.

The Red Eagles fired their handguns at the incoming missiles, shooting out as many as they can, while the Marines used their heavy weapons to blow up the Ptolemaic Bradley and Combat Motorbike.

"Feels just like a video game..." Ash remarked about the events so far. "A mission starts out easy, then gets more difficult as we progress through it..."

A large number of Guerillas proceeds to come and mob the Mercenaries, and proceeds to get utterly destroyed just as fast as they came.

...

It was the last section of the abandoned town, and the Mercenaries quickly found themselves face-to-face with a Future Di-Cokka and several Future Rebel Soldiers.

"And guess this is where things get really tough..." Jason pointed out as he quickly scores a headshot on one of the Future Rebel Soldiers.

Noticing that the Future D-Cokka is taking aim, the Mercenaries quickly took cover behind the nearby buildings, knowing that the Future Rebels are very accurate with their shots.

The Future Rebel Soldiers then slowly approaches where the Mercenaries are hiding, electrified gloves charged and ready. But none of them ever got the chance to land any attacks, as the Mercenaries were better at close quarters combat than they were.

With the Future Rebel Soldiers taken out, the Mercenaries jumped out of their cover, and peppered the Future Di-Cokka with their weapons. The AI-controlled main battle tank was then blown up when Flynn fired a **Super Grenade** shell that went straight into its cannon muzzle.

"Now we're just lucky that we have better firepower than the last times we fought these guys..." Jenny said.

The Mercenaries moved on, and soon comes across something they've seen at the beginning of the current mission: a Future Bradley.

Not only was the Future Bradley able to start firing without charging up at all, it also fired what seemed to be anti-tank missiles (albeit still lacking propellant like their present day counterparts) in rapid succession.

"Yikes!" Ash exclaims as he and his friends hit the ground just in time to avoid getting hit by the missiles.

The Future Bradley then adjusts its aim, and fires off another stream of missiles within just two seconds of the previous one ending.

"Make that a double yikes!" This time, it was Mina who exclaimed as everyone rolled out of the way to evade the second stream of missiles.

Jason managed to roll himself closer to the Future Bradley, and just as it prepares for a third stream, the Red Eagles leader swiftly lands a series of Vulcan Chops.

The rapid-fire chopping doesn't cripple the Future Bradley, but Flynn's Berserk Punch which came almost immediately afterwards does, blowing a chunk of steel right off its launcher before it exploded.

"We're only glad that these things weren't meant to act alone on the battlefield." Leon told everyone.

The Mercenaries moved on. They quickly encounters a large group of Future Rebel Soldiers and Rebel Walkers, none of which gave the Mercenaries any chance to even utter a word before attacking en masse.

Flynn proceeds to empty the remaining **Super Grenade** shells into the mob, blowing up all but one Rebel Walker that then retaliates by deploying a mini attack satellite which fired just three shots before self-destructing. All three shots were intercepted by Mina's **Zantetsu Sword** before the Rebel Walker itself was blown up by concentrated fire from everyone else.

...

"There's Abbul Abbas! And he's getting away!"

The Mercenaries saw Abbul Abbas and a few Arabian Soldiers getting away on the same Ptolemaic Landseek as before the moment they reached the end of the abandoned town. By then, the Mercenaries have wrecked pretty much three fourth of the Arabian Revolutionaries' firepower and troops, so it would make sense Abbul Abbas is on full retreat.

"We must not let him get away!" Jenny said, gunning down some of the Rebel and Ptolemaic Bikers that were about to get away as well. "We're going after him!"

The Red Eagles and Mercenaries took off after the escaping Arabian warlord on three motorbikes each seating two, Jason and Jenny on one, Ash and Mina on another, and the Marines on a third.

...

Catching up with the escaping Abbul Abbas was very easy. In fact, the lack of resistance from the Arabian warlords or his allies made the Mercenaries suspicious about what's about to come. But they shrugged the suspicion off fairly quickly.

"Give up and face justice, you sonuvabitch!" Flynn hams it up with telling Abbul Abbas to surrender.

"Never, you government-loyal pigs!" Abbul Abbas responds with just as much ham.

"Come on, we blew up everything your friends gave to you!" Jason added in. "Why don't you save us all the trouble?"

"You did not destroy everything I have!" Abbul Abbas said, as he waved his sword once more as a signal to summon reinforcements.

The Mercenaries scanned the surrounding desert, and the skylines of the UAE's capital - Abu Dhabi - off the horizon. There were no signs of RAP Joint Force air supports.

But then, a localized tremor of a magnitude higher than the one caused by Big Shiee back in Beijing pretty much summed up for the Mercenaries what Abbul Abbas was going to summon.

"Holy shit..." Flynn swallowed hard when he remembered what could've caused the localized tremor.

"Now say your last prayers to your god as what amounts to the firepower of gods annihilates you!" Abbul Abbas hams up one last bit right before he speeds off on his Ptolemaic Landseek, leaving the bike-riding Mercenaries behind.

Moments after the Arabian warlord makes his getaway, something enormous emerged from below the desert sands close to the Mercenaries, spraying sand all over them and their bikes.

Now the Red Eagles and Marines are able to get a close-up look of the enormous construct. It has the control tower of Big Shiee, but not only is it three times bigger than the land battleship, the arsenal it carries appears to be a Frankenstein's Monster jumble up of weapons ripped straight from other war machines. For starters, its stern has Metal Rear's napalm cannon, Rebel Gigant's missile launchers (a pair of them in fact), what looked like three Bull Chan cannons mashed into a single block, and Crablops' Metal Mole canister. Its portside has three Ptolemaic Bradley missile launchers, four of Keesi III's machine guns and two of Dragon Nosuke's incendiary drone launchers. Its bow has the Sandmarine's incendiary shells launcher, Crablops' Torso's cannon of unidentified munitions, Hozmi's plasma cannon and (strangely enough) the Venusian Brain Robot's electric ball spammer.

Both the Red Eagles and Marines dropped cold sweat upon seeing the massive construct, despite the hot desert air and the exhaust fumes given off by said massive construct.

"Tasukete kami..." [God help us...] Mina uttered with just as much fear as everyone else were experiencing at the moment.

**BOSS BATTLE: _Huge Shiee_.**

Huge Shiee, as the massive construct is called, quickly overtakes the Mercenaries and begins the battle by activating the electric ball spammer that is under its bow, spraying electric balls all over the place.

"Whoa man! Things escalated to ridiculous levels within just one minute of the fight starting!" Jason cried out as he tries his best to maneuver his bike around the electric balls.

But with this many of them, the best case scenario is getting grazed by one of them, which is what happened to the Mercenaries' bikes. Good thing the grazing were nowhere near vital components.

Huge Shiee then powers down the electric ball spammer, and fires several shells of unidentifiable function from the unidentified munitions cannon, as well as several plasma balls from the plasma cannon, all with unpredictable trajectory which the Mercenaries once again barely dodges.

Before the Mercenaries can recuperate, the unidentified munitions cannon shifted its aim toward the ground and started releasing what looked like the same bouncing bombs used by the Hairbuster Riberts in large numbers, _and_ then pairs the bouncing bombs with the Sandmarine's infamous incendiary shells torrent at the same time, making the total barrage absolutely monstrous.

The wheel guards of the Mercenaries' motorbikes dislodged after the gang were done with avoiding being hit by the combined barrage. The Mercenaries themselves weren't faring well, having taken in sand and soot all over their bodies in addition to part of their clothes getting burnt off.

"I thought Sandmarine was a monster! But this sonuvabitch is like Godzilla on steroids!" Flynn complains loudly. "I'd rather have my old sorties back!"

After that, Huge Shiee can be seen powering up the electric ball spammer again.

"Ash, get me closer to it!" Mina told the chainsaw-wielding mercenary as she pulls out the **Zantetsu Sword** she has been keeping for a while.

Ash, remembering what the **Zantetsu Sword** is capable of, gets what the Japanese girl is planning. "Just hang on tight, dear!" He then pulls the throttle all the way, and the motorbike speeds off, getting closer to Huge Shiee's bow.

Then as the electric ball spammer finishes charging and starts spraying its energy payload, Mina uses the **Zantetsu Sword** to literally erases the electric balls as they come out of the electric ball spammer, swinging the sword as fast as she can.

The fact that the **Zantetsu Sword** releases a short-distance razor sharp wind with each swing meant that the electric ball spammer itself is also being sliced like hot knife through butter as Mina intercepted its payload. After several rounds of slicing and having its payload erased by razor winds, the electric ball spammer burst into flames as it fell loose from its socket. By that point, the **Zantetsu Sword** had snapped in half due to overuse.

Ash was able to maneuver the bike out of the way of the wrecked weapon in time. "Nice one, Mina!"

The chainsaw-wielding mercenary then releases the throttle a bit to further the distance from Huge Shiee just as it fires up the unidentified munitions cannon and plasma cannon.

"Leon, buddy, I want you to shotty blast one of those two as many times as you can!" Flynn said to Leon as he guns the throttle of the bike shared by the Marines.

"Understood, friend." The Chinese-American Marine acknowledges and gets his **Shotgun** ready for the plan in mind.

The moment Flynn closes the distance, Leon let loose with his **Shotgun**, emptying as many shells as he could into the plasma cannon and unidentified munitions cannon. The former only got to fire two plasma balls before an explosion occurred from under it that blew it right out of its socket, the latter held for quite a bit but was heavily damaged. By that point, the **Shotgun** has ran out of ammo, and Leon threw it away to lighten the overall load.

Flynn manages to navigate the bike around the plasma balls and unidentified shells. The two Marines proceeds to use their handguns to finish off the unidentified munitions cannon, which doesn't explode per se but simply came loose and rolled right out of its base.

"Oh, yeah! Another one down!" Flynn cheered loudly, thrusting his left hand up in the air.

Of course, Huge Shiee's bow still has one weapon left: the incendiary shells launcher, which it proceeds to use.

A torrent of incendiary shells immediately rains down from above the skies, but as the Mercenaries have experience from fighting Sandmarine, and the addition of them being on motorbikes right now, they found it much easier to navigate through the torrent this time.

"Screw this!" Jason curses out loud, and proceeds to fire his handgun at the incendiary shells launcher.

The other Mercenaries followed suit, firing their handguns at the launcher while navigating through torrents after torrents of incendiary shells. It took quite a while before the launcher bursts into flame and was rendered inoperable from the damages sustained.

"The bow's gone! Now its time for the portside!" Jenny pointed out, as Huge Shiee seems to be purposely slowing itself down to line up its portside with the Mercenaries.

Huge Shiee was much, much more aggressive with its portside weapons, basically firing all of them at the same time.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! This is way too much!" Caught by surprise by the barrage of missiles, incendiary drones and machine gun rounds, the Mercenaries frantically tried to increase the distance between themselves and the portside of Huge Shiee. A machine gun round found its way into the bike occupied by the Marines, tearing the left handlebar right off. Jason and Jenny's bike had its headlight blasted right off while Ash and Mina's had its entire exhaust pipe sheared off.

"Well, we're going to have to do something about this!" Ash called out to the others.

Flynn locked his eyes on the missile launcher that was sitting just behind the portside tread of Huge Shiee, and then without warning gunned the throttle and approached it.

The American Marine, after ducking below a fired missile, proceeds to Berserk Punch said missile launcher as it was sitting right on the edge of the portside and was also pretty close to the ground, tearing it into pieces. "Take that!" He quickly guns the throttle again and backs away when the four machine guns fired upon him and Leon.

"You are reckless, friend..." Leon told Flynn.

"I know!" Flynn answers.

Ash's approach was even more extreme. He gunned down the throttle more than Flynn did, and then performed a wheelie at the same time for an enormous burst in speed. And he's driving the bike right toward the portside tread.

"What are you doing?!" Mina, freaked out by the sudden stunt she was unwillingly involved in, cried out.

Ash did not answer, as he jumps the bike over the tread, and proceeds to stab his chainsaw at another missile launcher that was about to fire a missile. The chainsaw cuts through the missile launcher with enough force to shred it to pieces. The bike then lands on top of the tread guard and proceeds to speed down it, using his chainsaw to shred another missile launcher to pieces on the way down. As soon as he lands the bike on the sandy desert ground, he jerked the bike hard right to avoid getting caught under the tread.

"You are not a ninja! Don't ever do that again!" Mina was both scared and angry after experiencing Ash's stunt, and was about to pinch him on his leg until she noticed that a strand of his hair seems to be on fire.

"Ugh... My head may have had a close shave with one of those flaming heli-drones... whatever they are..." The chainsaw-totting mercenary said, as he raises a hand to put out the burning strand of hair.

Now with the missile launchers taken out, firing back at the machine guns should be a bit easier, although by all means still difficult, what's with them firing non-stop at the Mercenaries.

"With four machine guns firing at you at the same time, you'd say that this is too much dakka..." Jason throws in an offhand comment while managing to steer his and Jenny's bike away from incoming machine gun fire and incendiary drones.

The Mercenaries combined their firepower on one of the machine guns, and it fell apart after several hundred rounds of fire. The gun itself dislodged from the wrecked turret base and fell toward the Mercenaries as a **Heavy Machine Gun**.

Jenny snatched the **Heavy Machine Gun** before it hit the desert ground, "Thank you!" and then starts firing it at one of the other machine guns.

Two more machine guns were taken out by Jenny's **Heavy Machine Gun**. These two also have their guns fall off from their turret base, and are snatched from midair by Mina and Leon respectively. They then proceed to shoot up the fourth and last machine gun, but this one exploded with enough force that it launched its gun away from the scene.

The Mercenaries with their new firepower, shoots up both incendiary drone launchers before either can deploy another drone.

"We're done with the portside! Now its time for the stern!" Flynn points out, as Huge Shiee purposefully slowed itself down again, this time the massive land battlecruiser allowed the Mercenaries to completely overtake it before powering up its stern batteries.

Rather than going all out or shooting blindly, Huge Shiee was very strategic with its stern batteries.

For starters, the short-ranged napalm cannon is only fired when the Mercenaries are staying close to Huge Shiee. Then the triple smoothbore cannons for suppressive fire when they move away from it. The Gigant missile launchers would occasionally launch homing missiles everywhere to force them into a tight group, and then Metal Moles were deployed from the canisters on random intervals to at least redirect the Mercenaries' firepower away from the stern.

The Mercenaries, having almost fell for all of those tricks, took a deep breath and almost gagged on the desert sand blown into the air by Huge Shiee.

"Now we're being chased!" Ash called out.

A Metal Mole popped out from the ground all of a sudden and was about to blow up Ash and Mina when Flynn moved in and intercepted it with a Berserk Punch.

"Be careful! I've never faced an enemy that was actually smart enough to use decoys as cannon fodder!" Flynn told the others.

The Mercenaries first focused their firepower on the Metal Mole canister as it was deploying Metal Moles to distract them from the other stern batteries. What they didn't expect is that the Metal Mole canister would be so tough as to be able to tank almost a thousand **Heavy Machine Gun** rounds before being blown up. By then, all three **Heavy Machine Guns** were out of ammo.

"Well... Guess we'll have to blow up the rest of the stern with our handguns..." Jenny deadpanned as she throws her **Heavy Machine Gun** away.

The Gigant missile launchers fired another burst of missiles, with all of them converging onto the Mercenaries while the triple smoothbore cannons fired shots all over the place to utterly throw off the Mercenaries.

"Not falling for that again!" The Mercenaries proceed to quickly shoot down all the Gigant missiles with their handguns, making dodging the smoothbore shells all the easier.

Flynn snatched a piece of rock from the ground without letting go of the throttle of his bike, and with all his might, "Eat this!" the Marine threw it at one of the Gigant missile launchers with enough force to completely dislodge it from its base. He then snatches another rock from the ground, and proceed to do the same to the other Gigant missile launcher, this time the rock hit a missile as it was leaving the launcher, blowing the whole thing up as the result.

Huge Shiee retaliates by firing its napalm cannon and triple smoothbore cannon all over the place at the same time, making the situation hotter (no pun intended) than it already was.

"Get ready to take over the wheel, Jenny." Jason said as he eases the throttle of the bike he's driving. "I'm gonna beat this bitch up!"

Jenny quickly gets what the Red Eagles leader is planning, as the motorbike slowed enough that Huge Shiee appears to be catching up. "Oh no, you don't..."

Before the blue-haired mercenary girl can finish, Jason had already jumped off the bike and attached himself to the stern of Huge Shiee. Jenny quickly climbs into the driver seat and guns the throttle just as a napalm shell is fired at her.

Jason slowly and steadily climbs onto the top of the stern, "Say hello to my little friend!" then whipping out his Machete, he proceeds to Vulcan Chop the triple smoothbore cannon. As Jason was standing in the blind spot of the triple smoothbore cannon, he is able to tear it to shred while the turret could do nothing about it. After taking out the smaller turret, he then slowly makes his way toward the napalm cannon. "You're next!" As there was no platform for him to stand on near the napalm cannon, Jason has to hang on to the turret base with his right hand, while he uses his Machete to slash at the base of the napalm cannon.

It took a while before Jason's slashing must've severed some form of wiring critical to the napalm cannon, as the weapon suddenly begins to release a massive amount of spark.

"Uh, oh..." Jason knew he shouldn't hang near the napalm cannon any longer, as he climbs back down as quickly as he could. He jumped off the stern just as the napalm cannon went off in a huge fireball.

Jenny quickly catches Jason in the sidecar of the motorbike. "You are amazing, you know that?" She said to him.

Jason simply gave a thumbs-up before he righted himself in the sidecar.

With all the weapons on its stern taken out, Huge Shiee seems to slow down even further with no more hostile intent.

"Did we do it?" Ash wondered if the battle is over.

"I'd say: not yet." Flynn was the one who replies. "We may have taken out all of its weapons, but this bitch has yet to fall apart. I got the feeling it still has a surprise waiting to be unleashed..."

Flynn was right, the stern of Huge Shiee suddenly expanded sideways, and a Vulcan cannon of enormous caliber is seen emerging from the opening.

"Uh... shit...?" Ash deadpanned about the situation.

Huge Shiee then fires the Vulcan cannon at the Mercenaries without any further delay. Not only does it fire shots at a rate almost faster than the Vulcans of any Slug vehicles, each individual shot is more like a naval artillery in terms of destructive power, tossing up huge amounts of sand every time they hit the ground.

"Now that's overkill!" Flynn exclaimed.

The Vulcan cannon was firing naval artillery-caliber rounds at such a ridiculously high RPM that the Mercenaries could neither close in to nor distance themselves from the weapon without bringing any further risk to themselves.

"How are we supposed to destroy this thing?!" Jenny exclaimed loudly, struggling to steer the bike around the hail of artillery.

A shell landed right behind the bike Jason and Jenny rode on, blasting them several feet into the air before they landed back on solid ground on the wheels of their bike. The strut connecting the bike itself to the sidecar is almost hanging loose as a result of the damage sustained.

Unable to get closer to or further from Huge Shiee's Vulcan cannon, the Mercenaries tries their best to avoid being hit by the shots of the rotary cannon while they fire their handguns at it. The puny handgun bullets are hardly scratching the surface of the Vulcan cannon.

"Well, it can only fire at one of us at a time, so we should split up!" Leon suggested to the others, noting how there is only one Vulcan cannon.

The Red Eagles nodded as they and the Marines split up and stretched the distance between each other.

Leon was right, as the Vulcan cannon could only fire at one target at a time, Huge Shiee was forced to pick one bike to fire at while the occupants of the other two peppered it with handgun rounds.

When the Vulcan cannon was busy firing at Ash and Mina's bike, Flynn closed in toward the artillery as stealthily as possible so he wouldn't turn its attention onto him. The moment his bike was next to it, he throws a Berserk Punch at the Vulcan cannon.

The tank-busting punch seems to have slightly loosened the Vulcan cannon from its base. However, it is still far from critical damage, as the artillery instantly turns its attention at the Marines.

"Time to go!" Flynn gunned the throttle right before the Vulcan cannon starts rapid-firing naval artillery shells at him and Leon's bike point-blank.

Now with the Vulcan cannon being kept busy by the Marines, it is Jason and Jenny's turn to get up close to the artillery.

"I'll be the brains, and you'll be the brawns!" Jenny said to Jason, as she steers the bike closer to the Vulcan cannon.

As soon as the bike gets close enough, "ATATATATATATA!" Jason unleashed the might of his Vulcan Chop on the Vulcan cannon.

The Vulcan cannon resists the attack once again. Although This time, the damage it took was just enough to cause sparks to fly out from its base, but that still isn't enough to completely shut it down.

"Gun it!" Jason told Jenny when he sees the Vulcan cannon shifting its attention onto them.

Like Flynn and Leon, Jason and Jenny manages to get out of the way just in time to avoid being point-blanked by the rapid-firing naval artillery shells, albeit barely, as the two Red Eagles found a leak was inflicted upon the gas tank of their bike, and its leaking fuel fast. "Let's hope we have enough to last till this bitch sinks..."

As Huge Shiee is fixated on firing the Vulcan cannon at Jason and Jenny's bike, Ash steered his bike as close to the artillery as possible, while Mina prepares some of her anti-tank mines (the same ones she took out Metal Rear with back at San Francisco) to be used against the Vulcan cannon.

"Make it go boom, Mina!" Ash told the Japanese girl.

But this time, Huge Shiee notices the two Red Eagles closing in on it, and turns its Vulcan cannon at them before they can get any closer.

"Okay, bad idea!" Ash exclaims as he quickly guns the throttle, knowing what's to come.

Mina knowing that there's no way to get any closer to the Vulcan cannon, chucked the entire batch of armed anti-tank mines at the artillery. Most of the mines were shot out of the air by the ensuing naval artillery shells barrage, some landed on the ground and then exploded against Huge Shiee's hull doing little damage...

...But one had lodged itself in the seams between the multiple gun barrels of the Vulcan cannon, and it was holding tight despite the artillery firing at such a high RPM its barrels appeared to be a blur.

Then with a deafening boom, the anti-tank mine exploded. The ordnance had completely destroyed the Vulcan cannon. The remaining artillery shells that are still in its massive breach also went off in a series of chain reaction that quickly spreads all over Huge Shiee, before a massive explosion emerging from right under its control tower broke the massive land battlecruiser in half. The two halves of Huge Shiee travelled at momentum speed a bit more before slowing down, and the massive land battlecruiser then starts to sink below the ground, tossing up massive amounts of sand like a localized sandstorm in the process.

_**Huge Shiee**_** defeated.**

A massive sinkhole then spawns where Huge Shiee sank, as the Mercenaries speeds off on their bikes.

"YEAH! We did it!" Jason cheered loudly.

"Now that's what I'd call teamwork!" Flynn joins in on the congratulations. "Even though most of my previous sorties had me going solo..."

"No Repair Buckets for you, bitch!" Ash fires off an insult at the now-sunk Huge Shiee.

...

Location: Outskirts of Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.

By the time the Mercenaries caught up with Abbul Abbas, they found that the Arabian warlord's Ptolemaic Landseek had crashed right into a sandbar that was just jutting out of the sand. Since Regular Army reinforcements just happened to be gearing up close to his position, Abbul Abbas had pretty much surrendered himself without further resistance.

"You win, government dogs..." Abbul Abbas said as he waved a white flag over his head, knowing that the Mercenaries must've taken out Huge Shiee if they are able to get here.

The Mercenaries got off their bike, and looked at the Arabian warlord.

"Well, sucks to be you." Jenny commented.

Just then, the motorbikes that the Mercenaries rode on a while ago falls apart after all the damages sustained from fighting Huge Shiee.

The Mercenaries simply looked at each other, dusted themselves clean of sand, before they laughed out loud in celebration.

**MISSION COMPLETE!**

* * *

**Afterwords**

Well, sorry about the massive delay of this chapter. I have two reasons to explain why.

Firstly, I got myself a severe case of fever by the time I finished the Sandmarine boss fight. I was so sick I strain myself just clicking on the Document Manager. Secondly, due to it being an original creation, I tried to make the Huge Shiee boss fight as explosively awesome as I can, and as a result it was longer than the rest of the chapter.

Wow, Huge Shiee sure gave the Mercenaries one heck of a trouble. If _Metal Slug: Mercenaries_ was a video game, I firmly believe that almost every player would be stuck on her for quite a while no matter which character they're playing as.

Upgrades given to the bosses:

Sandmarine: If either one of those weapons makes the fight against this bitch hard, then try fighting her as she uses_ all_ of her weapons at the same time!

I won't list the upgrades given to Huge Shiee, because she _isn't even canon_ to _Metal Slug_ to begin with. I modeled her after the Mission Six boss of _Metal Slug 5 Elite_, which was in turn modeled after Morden's Battleship from _Metal Slug 3D_. Do note that Huge Shiee is aligned with the Ptolemaic Army, despite being modeled after something that is aligned with the Rebels.

Now on to _Metal Slug Defense_ Ver 1.39...

Seriously, SNK? Another Survival Event? This one's even crazier, as the enemy base - this time a Fridge - would occasionally send out a souped-up Hi-Do that while doesn't pierce, do so much damage that even a Level 40 Slug Gigant won't last a third strike from it! Good thing it is not allowed to hit your base.

Big problem with this Event: apparently the point items and the aforementioned souped-up Hi-Do are mistakenly coded as enemy units, and as such, your units would actually attack them even though they aren't units at all.

Fun thing I learned from a few Taiwanese players: send out a couple of Winter Soldiers or Cat Infantries (both are Rebel Soldiers rolling a huge snowball in front of them, the latter has a White Cat from _Battle Cats_ standing on top), and if they ever reach the Fridge, you may enjoy a bottomless amount of fruit smoothies (the Event's point items are fruits this time). And since the fruits are mistakenly coded as enemy units, a large number of them will eventually hog up the enemy's Troop Deployment Count to the point that it is unable to do anything at all.

The Troop Deployment Count or TDC limits the number of units you can deploy at 50, and once you deploy your 50th unit counting an active Metal Slug Attack, the TDC locks up your unit selection screen and prevents you from sending out any more. The TDC will also deactivate any Spawners such as Morden Buses once the limit is reached.

Here's Ver 1.39 in a nutshell: _Metal Slug Advance_ bosses, plus Eri and Fio in Christmas outfits.

And wow, this is the largest document I've ever whipped up. Over 10K words...

Shout-out index:

"I'd rather fight Godzilla!" - This one's too obvious. Kill yourself if you don't get it.

"ATATATATATATATA!" - "You are already dead!" ~Kenshiro, _Fist of the North Star_.

"No Repair Buckets for you, bitch!" - I wonder how overpowered Huge Shiee would be if she were to be Kanmusu-fied in _Kantai Collection_?

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	12. Chapter 11: The RAP's Master Plan part 1

**Forewords**

Oh, hey! _Metal Slug Attack_ is finally released! I immediately downloaded it, and was quickly hooked up to it! All those new gameplay mechanics are very difficult for me to explain, but let's just say that even the Regular Soldier can be incredibly useful in both PVP and PVE if you Power Release him to four stars. With the same Power Release mechanics, the four protagonists can also be _extremely_ useful even into the late game.

As for _Metal Slug Defense_, I have decided to stop farming for stars after I got the Formor, Balor and Cabrakan (they're all from _Metal Slug Advance_) because the two Amadeus Computers are not quite useful, and all three of them are much more useless due to poor HP-to-AP ratio.

And so I downloaded Ver 1.40 as soon as it became available...

My comment for Ver 1.40: "SCREW YOU! RUGAL BERNSTEIN!" Yes! The infamous guy from _The King Of Fighters_ shows up in _MSD_ as a secret boss and unlockable unit! To unlock his stage first, you need to obtain the invitation from the KOF stage in Extra World 3, and it turns out to be an incredibly rare drop (I replayed the same stage a hundred times just to get it). And seeing on Youtube how even the experts have trouble even with the AP Level Max item, I decided to keep him immobilized with the Jamming item for the entire battle.

Shortly after beating Rugal with a whole bunch of Jamming items, I decided to retry the fight with no items... Well, he's difficult because he can reach your base in just _5 seconds_, fires off an attack every half a second, with each attack taking _20%_ away from your base HP. And then his melee attack - Genocide Cutter - seems to do over _60000 damage_ (higher than even Tani-Oh and Hozmi's special attacks combined, as proven when someone on the _Global Metal Slug Defense_ blog claims it OHKO'd a Level 40 Rebel Gigant) and automatically target aerial units as well! Oh, did I mention that he also has an estimated one _million_ HP? Let's not forget that he is even worse than a projectile eraser, as his special is a projectile _reflector_! And when you do get him from the shop afterwards, he got nerfed so much he's only useful for his HP-to-damage ratio.

Only good thing about this update is that Sandmarine has been buffed. Her normal attack hits faster, and her special now takes just 8-10 seconds to cool down.

If you're still in Ver 1.40, better get Sandmarine as soon as possible, because the survival event is gone by Ver 1.41... which finally introduces the long-awaited _Kraken_! How awesome is the Kraken? So awesome that almost everyone I meet in PVP are running Sandmarine and Parachute Truck with the sole purpose of shooting it down. Because of that, I plan to replace my Slug Gigant with it.

Before I end off my comments on _MSD_ Ver 1.41, let me give you a warning: do NOT run the Super Devils in PVP! Their HP-to-AP ratio is the most horrible in the entire game!

* * *

**Chapter 12: The RAP's Master Plan, part 1**

Time: 1445 Hour; 31st of December, 2040.

Location: RAP Joint Force Headquarters; outskirts of Santa Cruz, Bolivia.

Somewhere in the remote regions of Bolivia, an army base fully equipped to house ICBM launch platforms and large aircrafts was built by the RAP Joint Force for their war against the Regular Army, or rather the Regular Commandos. One could say that it is extremely overkill to use everything in this base just to kill a few individuals.

Rebel Soldiers and Amadeus Syndicalists lined up at the base's airfield as Morden and Amadeus arrived in the same emergency jet they used to escape from the Secret Weapon Of The Luftwaffe when it was shot down by the Red Eagles. The soldiers saluted their respective leaders as the two walked down the airfield toward the main structure of the base.

"Well, well..." Morden expressed his thoughts. "Even though it disappointed me that Abbul Abbas was defeated again despite all the new things we provided him with..."

The Devil Rebirth produced a piece of paper from his shirt pocket and unfolded it. Said piece of paper contained two photos: one of Abbul Abbas being taken into custody by Regular Army troops in Abu Dhabi, the other of the Regular Army hauling (with some difficulty) the wrecked Sandmarine and Huge Shiee out of their sandy grave.

"At least we distracted those government clowns long enough for this base to be built without being disturbed." Morden continued and then throws the piece of paper away. "And now, I can finally make the Regular Army pay for the death of my son!" He proceeds to do his signature evil laugh afterwards.

Amadeus, following Morden from behind. "And what part do I have in your plans?"

Morden stopped in his tracks, and turned to address the syndicate leader. "This base would never be possible without you, as is getting the Time Portal of my army's future selves reactivated."

"And the Ptolemaic Army?" Amadeus added another question.

Morden groaned at being reminded of the Illuminati-like organization. "I let them in on my plans because they too have a grudge against Marco Rossi and his gang. I never liked those demon worshippers, anyway..."

"So I assume that you will have them destroyed afterwards?" Amadeus asked one more question.

"Of course!" Morden gives a definite answer as he clenched his fist. "I only needed the firepower they have for my plans. After I destroy the Regular Army, I'm sending them and their cult 666 feet down under!"

...

Elsewhere in the outskirts of Santa Cruz at the same time, the Regular Hi-Do carrying the Red Eagles and Marines hovered above the jungle canopy as the Mercenaries fast-roped onto the jungle grounds. The Regular Hi-Do left the scene very quickly as this is considered enemy territory.

"So, the RAP Joint Force had a base built in the Bolivian wilderness, and they used Abbul Abbas to keep Regular Command's attention away." Jason noted, while making sure he has enough handgun ammo to go around.

"Well, more precisely, their Headquarters." Jenny corrected, as she checked her Taser. "But we'll be told to have it blown up, anyway."

Flynn punched a nearby tree hard to get everyone's attention, though he made sure the punch isn't so hard that it would knock the tree over. "Enough talk! Let's trash some RAP property and kick some RAP asses!"

...

_**Mission briefing**_

_It was a good thing that you've put Abbul Abbas and his revolutionaries out of commission when you took out both the Sandmarine and the enormous land battleship called Huge Shiee. But I have only bad news for you right now..._

_Following an interrogation, Abbul Abbas had revealed to us that the RAP made his second attempt at a revolution possible with the sole purpose of distracting Regular Command from what they are really planning: a massive base housing several ICBM launch platforms. When we tried to get him to reveal more about this base, the Arabian warlord told us that the RAPs knew he would get captured sooner or later, and refused to tell him anymore about the base for good measure._

_Although that didn't stop SPARROWS from locating the base. Satellite scans had revealed some strange, most definitely artificial readings somewhere in the outskirts of Santa Cruz, Bolivia, with the readings of the same unknown radioactive particles from the Mount Everest base but in denser amounts. We believe that might be where the RAPs have built the aforementioned base._

_So here are your missions: locate and then infiltrate the base. Destroy all the ICBMs and launch modules, along with any other operations down there and as much of the base itself as you can, even if it turned out to be another distraction._

_Finally, as this base may possibly be used as a Headquarters of sorts, expect massive resistance from the enemies the closer you get to it. We have also detected signs of what appeared to be the Rebel Gigant lurking somewhere in the jungle, but we are unable to track it, so watch out._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

_..._

**MISSION TEN START!**

The Red Eagles and Marines trekked through the jungle interrupted by nothing for a full minute, until something made them stop mid-trek.

"The voice may be different..." Jason pointed out. "...But that laugh sounded just like Allen O'Neil's."

"Yeah..." Jenny agrees. "But the voice is not the same one, so who could it be?"

The Mercenaries looked at the top of a short tree, and saw someone just as bad as the Devil Sergeant himself: his son, Allen Jr.

"So you are the second bunch of people to tae down my dad with your wits alone." Allen Jr. chewed the scenery.

The next comment to come from the Mercenaries was Ash's "Like father, like son..."

Mina then follows up with "Only difference is that Junior wears a shirt."

Allen Jr. stopped chewing the scenery in response to the Mercenaries' blunt response.

"That was not what I was expecting..." He said as he face-palmed.

"It sort of helped to get used to the father..." Flynn tosses in his comment bluntly.

"And after that, the son won't sound just as annoying anymore." Leon continues the sentence with just as much bluntness.

Allen Jr. groaned in disappointment, but then resumes chewing the scenery. "Never mind that! I want you to know that I'm not the same dumb muscle that my dad is!"

The Devil Sergeant's Son proceeds to fire a small burst from his machine gun into the sky. The bullets didn't hit anything, but maybe that was the point, as the shots were quite loud.

Allen Jr. then jumps off the short tree, and lands in the side car of an army motorcycle that popped out from the foliage. "Maybe you can send my dad back home to grandma, but you'll have to do better to have me meet him in hell!" As the Rebel Soldier driving the motorcycle revs up the engine, Allen Jr. grabs his last opportunity to add a few more words. "If you have your feet insured, then good for you! If not... Sucks to be you!" The motorcycle then quickly leaves the scene with Allen Jr. in the sidecar as he mimicked his father's signature laugh.

The Mercenaries just stood there as the dust from the motorcycle's wake is blown right in their face.

"Yep, not much different than his pop." Jason pointed out for everyone.

...

Shortly after their brief encounter with Allen Jr., the Mercenaries resumed their trek through the jungle. The first thing they encounter is an Iron Iso positioned in front of a Garbage Fortress (a makeshift watchtower literally made out of garbage), which are then joined by a squad of Ptolemaic Regimental Masknell.

"Piece of cake!" Flynn said as he rushed forward and delivered a Berserk Punch at the Iron Iso, tearing the cannon right off the chassis.

After avoiding the rain of bullets fired by the squad of Ptolemaic Regimental Masknell, Ash jumped high up in the air, "Say hello to my little friend!" and proceeds to drive his chainsaw into the lead Masknell, taking it out instantly along with the rest of the squad in a chain reaction.

The Mercenaries then focuses their firepower on the Garbage Fortress. The makeshift watchtower held on for quite a while, but eventually gave out and toppled after several hundred bullets have been pumped into it, burying the poor Rebel Soldier underneath the resulting pile of heavy garbage.

"Ouch..." Jenny winced at the thought that someone is buried under the pile of heavy garbage. "I don't think he can dig himself out anytime soon..."

...

The Red Eagles and Marines moved on afterwards, and ran into a fortification which consisted of... just a massive pile of garbage, or at least that's what it looked like.

"From what I learned in my previous sorties, the enemies will never leave a wall unguarded no matter how tough it was." Flynn said as he reloads his handgun. "Got the feeling that..."

The American Marine's sentence was interrupted when Allen Jr. suddenly appeared on top of the fortification, fired his machine gun at something above the Mercenaries before leaving the scene with his laugh echoing through the jungle.

The sound of ropes being severed is then followed by several huge barrels of TNT tumbling down toward the Mercenaries from above. As it is too late to shoot out the TNT barrels, the Mercenaries chose to get out of the way instead. They manage to avoid a fiery death, but just barely.

"Now I think I know how the US soldiers felt during the Vietnam War..." Leon remarked as he watched the aftermath of the booby trap that almost killed everyone.

"And I thought I have the biggest bombs..." Mina said while picking herself up from the ground.

Just as the Mercenaries are about to start attacking the fortification, a Claw Unit suddenly jumped out from behind it and lunged at them.

Jason quickly intercepts the Claw Unit with a well-timed Vulcan Chop, tearing it into pieces. "Whew, that was another close one. Who knows what other unfair move they might pull on us?"

A MG Unit popped out on top of the fortification and started firing its Gatling gun arms at the Mercenaries. But as it wasn't all that accurate with its shots, the Red Eagles and Marines were able to quickly take it out with their handguns.

"Now we just need to knock this wall down." Ash said. "Mina, do your job!"

Mina just smiled as she procured one of her anti-tank mines and threw it at the fortification. One mine alone was enough to completely annihilate the fortification, as well as the Future Girida-O and Future Bradley hiding under it.

"And that's what I'd call a big bad boom!" Ash announces as he gave Mina a pat on her shoulder.

...

The Mercenaries continued their trek through the jungle, after which they found themselves running into a Future MV-280C jeep... along with Allen Jr. on the same army motorcycle he got away on earlier, as he fires yet another burst from his machine gun at the treetops before leaving the scene with his laugh echoing all over the jungle.

The Red Eagles and Marines, having learned their lessons with the last trap, walks away from where they stood before a large pile of spiked girders fell all over that spot.

Saying nothing about the trap, the Mercenaries turned their attention on the Future MV-280C, which had just begun to fire its high-powered machine gun at them.

As the machine gun was obscuring its sights, the Future MV-280C could only fire in a straight line, and the Mercenaries easily dodges the shots by just stepping aside.

"Even decades into the future, it never occurred to these guys that such a design is utterly useless against pretty much anything..." Jenny lampshaded the utter impracticality of the design of the future gun jeep.

The Red Eagles gave the Marines the honor of taking out the Future MV-280C. Flynn and Leon did so by unloading entire magazines' worth of handgun bullets into it, after which it blows up, leaving behind only a burning shell.

Two more Future MV-280C jeeps appeared from behind the jungle foliage, and the Mercenaries takes out both of them just as quickly as they did the first.

"You... SUCK!" Jason taunted the destroyed jeeps, and proceeds to mock them further by flipping one over with just his bare hands.

...

The Mercenaries moved on, and soon encounters Allen Jr. again. This time, the Devil Sergeant's Son whipped out his Bowie Knife and hacked off one of the supporting struts of the wooden watchtower next to him, causing it to topple toward the Mercenaries with a loud creak.

"Look out!" Jason cried out as he jumped in and intercepted the falling watchtower with a series of Vulcan Chops, shredding it into harmless little pieces of wooden splinters. An intact **Heavy Machine Gun** is mixed in the pile of splinters.

By the time the watchtower was dealt with, Allen Jr. has already left the scene while (again) mimicking his father's infamous laugh.

"I do think that laugh is... getting on my nerves..." Leon pointed out, followed by him making a deadpan groan.

A bunch of Future Rebel Soldiers including a Jetpack Bazooka Soldier entered the scene, followed by a whole stream of modern Rebel Fanatic Bikers.

"Uh... do anyone of you guys have motor insurances?" Ash swallowed hard at the scene as he asked his fellow Mercenaries.

"We do." Jenny replies as she snatches the **Heavy Machine Gun** from the pile of splinters. "They don't."

The blue-haired Red Eagle proceeds to gun down the incoming stream of Rebel Fanatic Bikers with her new weapon, whilst the other Mercenaries covered her from incoming fire from the Future Rebel Soldiers.

When the Jetpack Bazooka Soldier flies too close to the Mercenaries, Mina jumped into the air and sliced him in half with her Katana.

A Future Rebel Soldier decided to lunge at the Mercenaries with his electrified glove charged, only to get caught by, and be thrown several feet into the air by Leon's Faux Argentine Backbreaker.

Two Future Bazooka Soldiers attempted to fire their laser cannons at the Mercenaries, but Jenny noticed them quickly and shifted her aim just enough to take them both out.

It took several minutes before the mob of Rebels was fully dealt with. By that point, Jenny's **Heavy Machine Gun** has only 25 units of ammo left.

"Wow. I wonder how they afford the gas needed for all these bikes?" Jenny lampshaded while looking at the large pile of motorcycle wreckages.

One last Rebel Fanatic Biker suddenly appeared without warning, and he managed to jump off his bike and fling it at the Mercenaries.

"Oh no, you don't!" Flynn jumped to the front and destroyed the motorcycle with a Berserk Punch, before pulling out his handgun to blow the brains out of the Rebel Soldier.

Jason and Ash gave Flynn the thumbs-up, while Jenny and Mina clapped their hands at the Marine's cool action.

...

The Mercenaries continued forward. They soon found something that could be very useful to the mission.

"Hey, its the Slug Gigant!" Mina pointed forward at the giant robot that was placed near two sets of platforms. "Wonder how it got here?"

Laid below the Slug Gigant's feet is what appears to be the lower half of a shipping container. That alone should clue in to how the Slug Gigant could show up in the middle of a jungle, of all places.

Just as the Mercenaries are about to approach the Slug Gigant, they are interrupted by the arrival of Allen Jr. himself.

The Devil Sergeant's Son jumped off his getaway motorcycle, and then dismisses the Rebel Soldier driving it. He then turns toward the Mercenaries, and let out the very same laugh his father was infamous for.

"Well done!" He told the Red Eagles and Marines. "For being able to get through all that, you have proved yourselves to be more determined than those two cadets from back at the Regular Army's training program a few years ago!"

"Well, you had it coming when Walter Ryan and Tyra Elson rallied the other recruits to storm the base you were assigned commandership with." Ash responded bluntly. "Also, you were pretty amazing for being able to pass yourself off as a Regular Army officer back then..."

"Enough talk!" Allen Jr. interrupted hammily, as he brandishes his machine gun the same way his father did. "Maybe I can't make mincemeats out of all of you, but I'll at least make you wish your mommy was here!"

**BOSS BATTLE:_ Allen Jr._**

Allen Jr. begins his assault with a series of suppressive fire from his machine gun - a move his father didn't pull on the Red Eagles.

"Well, that's something different..." Ash comments on the Devil Sergeant's Son's choice of tactics.

With that said, the Mercenaries went forward with defeating Allen Jr.

...Or rather, try to. Allen Jr. proved to be a different side of the same coin in comparison to his father. He would keep his distance from the Mercenaries while firing his machine gun or throw some grenades at them, and in the event someone does manage to get up close and personal with him, he would whip out his Bowie Knife and engage them in a one-sided CQC which forces them to back off, in which he then hops over to the opposite end of the arena and repeats everything.

"Okay, he may have the looks and mouth of his father..." Jenny pointed out, after having used up the last 25 units of ammo of her **Heavy Machine Gun** with only exactly one grazing Allen Jr. "But their brains are entirely different..."

The Mercenaries then spreads out to evade a grenade thrown at them, which is then followed by several more grenades simultaneously, making the evading much more difficult for each individual mercenary.

"Come on, boys and girls!" Allen Jr. taunted the Mercenaries. "I know you can do better than this!"

Flynn and Leon regrouped at one end of the arena while the Red Eagles and Allen Jr. are duking it out on the other end.

The two Marines analyzed the situation, then looked at each other.

"You thinking what I'm thinking, buddy?" Flynn asked Leon with a smile.

"Of course, friend..." Leon replied with a similar smile.

Without saying another word, Leon crouched down to let Flynn use him as a stepping stone, after which Flynn launches himself high into the air.

"Hey, Junior!" The American Marine called out to the Devil Sergeant's son with his fists raised as he descended toward him. "Gravity-powered Berserk Punch!" Upon landing, Flynn socked Allen Jr. right in the face with a really hard Berserk Punch.

Allen Jr. had no time to react to the Berserk Punch, and was knocked out by it instantly.

Even after Allen Jr. was knocked out, the Red Eagles still kept their distance with him, pointing their handguns at his direction.

"He's going to get up any second now..." Ash told everyone.

Flynn went forward to give Allen Jr. a poke. "Seems pretty dead to me. Don't think anyone could survive taking a Berserk Punch to the fa..."

Before Flynn can finish voicing his opinion, Allen Jr. suddenly got back up and yelled "Is that all you got?!" He immediately breaks his machine gun in half with his bare hands, and whips out his Bowie Knife which he slashes at Flynn with.

Flynn was surprised, not just by the fact that Allen Jr. survived taking a Berserk Punch to the face, but also that the Bowie Knife is actually sharp enough to slice through his body armor. The Marine jumped away in sharp pain as the Bowie Knife sliced into his back, just barely missing his spinal cord.

"Ouch! Another inch deeper and I'll end up like those guys I fought in my past missions!" Flynn exclaimed, as he recuperates and prepares himself for the next phase of the fight against Allen Jr.

"Now I WILL make mincemeat out of you!" Allen Jr. chewed the scenery even more than his father did, before charging straight toward the Mercenaries with his Bowie Knife.

The Mercenaries easily dodges his first lunge, after which they pelt him with as many handgun bullets as they can. Allen Jr. then turns around for another lunge, which Jason parries with a series of Vulcan Chops.

"You're better than your pop, but still not good enough!" Jason taunted the Devil Sergeant's Son, before letting Ash take over the parrying.

The grey-clad Red Eagle proceeds to parry Allen Jr.'s strikes with his Chainsaw. "This Chainsaw may be meant for zombies, but it works just as well on soldiers like you!"

Then with no warning, Mina appeared directly behind Allen Jr., and slashed at him with her Katana.

Allen Jr. had been drained of all his stamina by the Japanese girl's sudden attack. He yelled out "You win! Like my dad usually say: I'll see you in hell!"

_**Allen Jr.**_** defeated.**

"We Japanese still believe our katana to be superior to all other types of swords!" Mina boasted while sheathing her Katana.

Ash stared at Mina for a few more seconds, before asking her: "Are you secretly a ninja?"

Mina replied with a soft "Perhaps, Ash-_kun_..."

With Allen Jr. defeated, the Mercenaries turned their attention back on the Slug Gigant.

"Okay, we know we need that thing for the rest of our trek through this jungle." Jason pointed out to the others. "But who's driving that thing? Giant robots are not my cup of tea..." The Red Eagles' leader first looked at Flynn.

"I tried piloting a giant robot on one of my last sorties." Flynn denied taking control of the Slug Gigant. "I was that close to failing the mission, so I think I'll stick with my own feet..."

Jason then looks at Leon.

"I don't want to pilot something that has a Vulcan on such an embarrassing position..." The Chinese-American Marine denies as well.

Ash and Mina both shook their heads, with their reason for denying being the same as Leon.

With no other possible candidates left, Jason turned toward Jenny.

"Well, who else is more fit to pilot that thing than me: Jenny Wakeman, the engineer of the Red Eagles?"

...

"So, which one do you prefer?" A Rebel Soldier asked another in a conversation. "Sergeant O'Neil, or his son?"

"Well, its a really hard choice..." The other Rebel Soldier replies. "Senior's muscles are like heavy tank armor, but Junior is much more strategic with his attacks."

"Personally..." The first Rebel Soldier cut in. "I prefer Sergeant O'Neil over his son."

"Is it because Senior can stand out in the open wearing no shirts at all?" The second Rebel Soldier questioned the first's choice of answer.

"No, because while Sergeant O'Neil just Leeroy Jenkins his way through every battle, his son is just way too fragile in comparison." The first Rebel Soldier voices his reason.

The two Rebel Soldiers' conversation are soon interrupted by one loud noise, followed by another one, and another one...

...And they're getting louder too.

The Rebel Soldiers dropped cold sweat, as they slowly turned around to see what's coming.

It's the Slug Gigant, taken control by the Mercenaries.

The two Rebel Soldiers, knowing they can't beat the Slug Gigant, just screamed "Oh, SHIT!" Before running into the foliage of the jungle.

...

"I just hate it when there's only one seat in the ride and the rest of us have to keep our balance on the outside!" Jason complained to everyone as he tried to keep his balance on the shoulder of the Slug Gigant, as does everyone else aside from Jenny.

"Then you all should hang on tighter!" Jenny told the others from inside the cockpit. "Because things are about to get rough!"

A whole bunch of Girida-O and Di-Cokka showed up and started firing at the Slug Gigant. But as those are the modern variants, their shots aren't strong enough to dent the armor of the Slug Gigant.

Jenny proceeds to have the Slug Gigant squash the entire battalion of tanks by stepping on them.

"I feel like this is going to be like one of those giant robot anime!" Mina comments on the situation.

A squadron of Flying Tara took formation in the background, before turning toward the Slug Gigant for a bombing run.

The Mercenaries that are on the Slug Gigant's shoulders braced themselves for the bombing run. Luckily for them, the bombs missed the giant robot entirely.

"Time to swat some flies!" Jenny said, as she times the Slug Gigant's uppercut to knock down the Flying Tara squadron when they come back for their second bombing run.

"Awesome sauce!" Ash congratulated.

Moving on, the Slug Gigant soon runs into another group of Rebel Fanatic Bikers, whose intention can be known from first sight as being to fling their bikes at the Slug Gigant.

What the Rebel Fanatic Bikers had not, or forgotten to take account of is that the Slug Gigant can throw punches unusually fast for something its size, as demonstrated when Jenny makes it swat all the flung bikes out of the air. The Rebel Fanatic Bikers then get gunned down by the Mercenaries' handguns for all their troubles.

...

The Slug Gigant continued through the jungle, and soon encounters a contender in the form of Allen O'Neil piloting the Rebel Gigant.

"Allen?!" Jason exclaimed. "I knew we should've blown him up back at Alcatraz!"

Allen chewed up the scenery (as usual for him) before saying to the Mercenaries: "Do you really think you can kill me with mere bullets? Well, think again, because the same can be said for my boy!"

The Mercenaries looked back at the way they came, before turning back toward Allen.

"Well, Junior did put up a good fight..." Flynn responded. "But he said he'll see us in hell..."

"But that is not the first time he said it, so I think he'll reappear anytime in the future..." Leon added.

Allen continued to chewed the scenery before continuing with his speech. "You did very well in beating my boy, but you'll have to fight me again later!" After finishing his sentence, the Devil's Sergeant turns the Rebel Gigant around and walks back into the foliage (leveling every tree in his way) as his infamous laugh echoed all over the jungle.

Ash groaned in response. "The only thing I hate just as much as Morden's laugh is the O'Neil family's..."

...

The Slug Gigant encountered another enemy formation shortly after the scene with Allen. This time, its a whole bunch of Eaca-B swooping down and releasing their missiles at the Mercenaries.

The squadron of Eaca-B are easy to deal with, but as there's just too many of them, the Mercenaries soon found themselves being overwhelmed by the marine bombers.

"Good thing this baby has a way to easily deal with mobs!" Jenny said, before she has the Slug Gigant send out a shockwave from its fists to disintegrate the squadron of Eaca-B as they all dived down at once.

...

As the Slug Gigant moved close enough for the RAP Joint Force's Headquarters to be seen in plain sight, a bunch of Claw Units suddenly appeared and started punching the Slug Gigant's feet. Although none of them could even chip the paint before they were all flattened under its feet.

"Guess the Ptolemaic Army didn't take fighting a giant robot into account when they built these Units..." Jenny pointed out.

It wasn't very long before several Mortar Soldiers and Bradley took position in front of the Slug Gigant, while reinforced by Paratroopers coming down from the skies.

"Oh, jeez, like this formation would work..." Jason deadpanned about the Rebels' poor choice of tactics. "Do your work, Jenny."

"With pleasure..." The blue-haired Red Eagle answered from within the cockpit.

...

The rest of the trek in the Slug Gigant is easily described as a pile of mangled Rebel Soldier corpses and Bradley wreckages left in the giant robot's wake, as well as trees that are knocked down by the crossfire in the process.

The Mercenaries prepared themselves as the Slug Gigant walked into the airfield of the RAP Joint Force Headquarters, where Allen is just waiting for them on his Rebel Gigant.

"Alright, you muscular freak!" Flynn attempted to carry out his taunt first. "We're here in a giant robot, and so do you! You're looking for a fight?"

Leon elected to give the American Marine a slap on his back. "Of course he's going to pick a fight with us..."

The Red Eagles and Marines then turn their attention back toward Allen.

"Like I said earlier, you are going to have a rematch with me!" Allen chewed the scenery, as he warms up the Rebel Gigant for a large-scale fight. "Not mincemeats this time, but I'll make scrap metal out of your ride!"

**Boss Battle: _Rebel Gigant_.**

"Hang on, everyone!" Jenny told the others as she braces for the upcoming battle. "This is going to be the roughest part of the ride!"

Allen starts off the battle by firing five missiles from the launcher next to the open cockpit.

The Mercenaries on the Slug Gigant's shoulders shot down four of the missiles with their handguns, but the fifth managed to slip through the shots and blew the top half of the cockpit off.

"Okay. Maybe Allen's the only one that can probably knock the Slug Gigant down..." Flynn noted the damage done.

A hatch on the Rebel Gigant's torso then opened, from which gravity-defying mines poured out of toward the Slug Gigant. Unlike the original Rebel Gigant of the Garbage Island Incident, this version's gravity-defying mines can withstand Vulcan rounds quite well, and were only deflected by the Slug Gigant punching them.

"Take this, you clowns!" Allen shouted out, as he preps the Rebel Gigant for a bulldozing charge.

And then the Rebel Gigant charged forward at a speed that should be impossible for something of its size.

"Roadblock!" Jenny called out, raising the Slug Gigant's arm in a defensive stance to block the bulldozing charge.

The bulldozing charge is successfully blocked, but Allen quickly follows the attack with an uppercut, which slipped through the space in between the Slug Gigant's arms, opening a large and obvious crack on its chest plate.

The uppercut also struck close enough to the Mercenaries that they were almost knocked off the Slug Gigant's shoulders by the air displacement.

"You sneaky bastard!" Ash cursed loudly, as he starts firing at Allen with his handgun, with little success due to the Rebel Gigant's cockpit somehow causing fired shots to move around Allen.

"Wars are never fought fair, after all!" Allen replies with a taunt. He then fires an anti-bunker shell from the Rebel Gigant's left arm at the Slug Gigant.

Jenny notices the firing in time, and acts just in time to have the Slug Gigant intercept it with a punch. It resulted in something equivalent to a human's arm ending in a stub.

"Ouch..." Flynn winced at one of the fists being blown off. "That's why I don't usually punch projectiles right in the tip of their warheads."

Allen then repeats his attack pattern all over, restarting with the missiles.

This time, the Mercenaries knew how the missiles act, and shoots down all five of them with precision, with the fifth one getting detonated just a few meters away from the gang.

Allen then begins releasing the gravity-defying mines again. As with the last batch, these ones are totally resistant to Vulcan rounds.

Only this time, Jenny uses the Slug Gigant's intact arm to swat the mines back at the Rebel Gigant. "Return to sender!" She said while doing so.

The deflected gravity-defying mines exploded against the Rebel Gigant, doing enough damage to take out the compartment that deployed them in the first place.

"Why, you little...!" Allen became pissed at the damage his ride took. He attempts to retaliate by preparing for another bulldozing charge.

Jenny quickly took the window of opportunity to tell the other Mercenaries of her plan. "I hope none of you have motion sickness!"

The others immediately guessed what Jenny was about to do. They held on to the Slug Gigant's shoulders as tightly as they could.

Then Allen charged, the Rebel Gigant coming toward the Slug Gigant with as much speed as its last charge did.

"Okay, Allen, this might seem a bit unusual for a giant robot..." Jenny said, before making the Slug Gigant crouch...

...Which is immediately followed by the Slug Gigant jumping into the air, and then delivering a midair kick right at he Rebel Gigant.

The Rebel Gigant reeled back in response to the kick, with Allen flinching in a similar manner in response. The kick was enough to completely wreck whatever vital component that was under the Rebel Gigant's chest plate.

There's also what appeared to be a small dome of some kind flickering from transparent to translucent around the Rebel Gigant's cockpit, before sparks erupted around Allen.

"Now's the chance!" Ash told the others as he pulled out his handgun again and fired at Allen. This time, the shot didn't get deflected, and hit the Devil Sergeant square in his chest.

The other Mercenaries followed suit by firing their handguns at Allen.

Before long, Allen had taken enough bullets that it is simply impossible for him to keep going, added with the fact that the Rebel Gigant is no longer responding to his commands. "You're better than I expected, Red Eagles! I will truly see you in hell!" He yelled out before falling off the cockpit and hitting the ground with a bone-crunching thud.

_**Rebel Gigant**_** defeated.**

"Yes! We won!" Jenny raised her hands up excitedly.

"I do believe his trip to hell this time will be a real one." Leon said. "Let's hope it's one-way."

"In the end, the good guys' giant robots will always prevail!" Mina joined in on the celebration.

**MISSION COMPLETE!**

As soon as the Rebel Gigant and its pilot are knocked down, the remaining Rebel Soldiers and Amadeus Syndicalist ran back into the safety of the RAP HQ in terror. However, it should be noted that not one Ptolemaic operative can be seen amongst the retreating crowd.

"That's right..." Jason noted the escaping crowd. "Aside from those Units back there, we did not encounter any Ptolemaic soldiers during our trek here."

"Well, they're not our main concern right now." Ash reassured. "Right now, we need to get inside this base and destroy as many parts of it as we can."

That being said, the bulkhead sealed itself shut once the last Rebel Soldier went through.

"I got good news and bad news, guys..." Jenny told everyone. "Good news is: the Slug Gigant should be able to punch through that bulkhead in about a minute. Bad news is: the Slug Gigant is too big to fully fit inside that base, so we'll have to continue on foot."

The Red Eagles groaned in disappointment, and stood there for a full minute.

* * *

**Afterwords**

Whew, after that trip to Taiwan two weeks ago, I was glad I'm able to meet my schedule and update this as quickly as I could.

Right, _Metal Slug Defense _Ver1.42 is released as I was writing this chapter. Let's go over it for a moment.

Kraken is still in it, no nerf. I've also finally noticed that Kraken's normal attacks are able to eat projectiles much like how the Maggots can stop projectiles while attacking. Hitting it with non-piercing projectiles is going to be a pain in the ass, plus its Special being able to hit the entire field while doing heavy damage (looks like good ol' Donald Morden will be going into the refrigerator from this point on).

The new units introduced in Ver1.42? I wasn't expecting some of them. They're respectively Walter Ryan, Tyra Elson (protagonists of _Metal Slug Advance_), Gimlet, Red Eye (_Metal Slug: 2nd Mission_) and freaking _Emain Macha_! Emain Macha was actually quite good despite that blind spot it has, or rather, they have. Also, I'm quite surprised that SNK actually retooled Gimlet and Red Eye's 8-bit sprites to fit the 16-bit style of MSD, right down to their idle and victory animations...

Additionally, _Metal Slug Attack_ also saw full release at about the same time. Hope to see (fight) you in it in the near future!

Boss buff list:

Allen Jr.: Aside from being much more tactical with his attacks, I don't think there's anything else that would qualify as a buff.

Rebel Gigant: Those mines that he releases from his torso are now immune to bullets, requiring the risky act of punching them to be deflected. Aside from that, Allen is also much more aggressive with the way he pilots this thing. That bullet-deflecting field around the cockpit doesn't count, since MS7 wise, shooting Allen does no more damage than shooting any other part of the Rebel Gigant.

Shout-out index:

*bullets moving around Allen* - This one should be familiar to those of you who played or watched playthroughs of _Metal Gear Solid 2_.

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	13. Chapter 12: The RAP's Master Plan part 2

**Forewords**

Two updates to _Metal Slug Defense_ have gone by (Ver1.43 came just hours after I uploaded the previous chapter), and I can easily describe Ver1.44 in a short sentence...

We're still having the Co-Op Event... And F**K ROOTMARS!

Holy jeez! Rootmars in Event Stage 6! Pretty much everyone agrees that son of a bitch is the hardest boss to have ever appeared in MSD! It's already very problematic when the map is so short enemies can start attacking your base as soon as they spawn (even shorter than Berserk Sol Dae Rokker's stage from back in Ver1.37 and Ver1.38). But the idiots at SNK decided to top it off by making Rootmars an _aerial_ living base! As with the original boss battle with him in _Metal Slug 3_, Rootmars can only be harmed by shooting the glass dome that housed his brain, problem is that said glass dome is considered an aerial unit, so most units won't bother attacking it unless you activate their special. I retired Slug Gigant from my deck to replace it with Kraken, but was forced to put it back to deal with Rootmars.

You know what's even crazier about the battle? There's actually _two_ Rootmars stacked on top of each other! Pay close attention to the mini-map at the top of the screen, and you'll see that there's a big pink rectangle overlapping the pink star that represented Rootmars' status as a living base. Damn, SNK, you must've smoked even more weed than when you did the _Battle Cats_ collaboration event...

And the reward for completing the tasks of said stage? The long awaited, but _extremely lousy_ Regular Army Truck. It spawns the seven protagonists of the main series randomly, all of whom at this point in the game are completely useless. Not only that, the protagonists spawned will always be Level _one_ even if you upgrade the Truck to Level 40.

Incredibly unfair boss battle plus incredibly lousy reward equals NOT WORTH IT! So I suggest you to just go back to PVP after you've obtained all the other units the event has to offer (even the Super Devils, they at least still have some uses)...

* * *

**Chapter 13: The RAPs' Master Plan, part 2**

Time: 1545 Hour; 31st of December, 2040.

Location: RAP Joint Force Headquarters; outskirts of Santa Cruz, Bolivia.

"And... Falcon PUNCH!"

With a swift swing of the Slug Gigant's fists, the bulkhead that sealed the main entrance of the RAP Joint Force Headquarters crumpled inwards, with metal wires and rebar hanging out of the hole.

"Again!"

The bulkhead finally falls apart as the Slug Gigant delivers a powerful forward punch, sending debris flying every direction.

"And unfortunately, this is where we have to leave the Slug Gigant behind." Jason said as he hopped over what is left of the bulkhead. "Thing's too big to fit in here."

"No worries, because we still have our guns." Jenny said while dismounting from the Slug Gigant. "We can't use massive firepower here, but neither can they."

"We'll hit them with what we've got!" Ash boasted while brandishing his chainsaw.

"Yes, we are going to win!" Mina cheered.

Flynn pulverizes a particularly large chunk of concrete with a Berserk Punch. "Guns or not, the RAPs are going down!"

Leon gave Flynn a pat on the shoulder and said, "Just don't get too cocky..."

_..._

**_Mission Briefing_**

_Good work on taking out RAP forces outside the Headquarters, Red Eagles. Now with the lack of enemy troops out there, Regular Army forces will have an easier time moving in to the Headquarters._

_However, as it may take a while for reinforcements to arrive at Santa Cruz, you people are still on your own as of now._

_Your mission remains the same: destroy as much of the Headquarters as you possibly can. This will deal a massive blow to the RAP's advantageous firepower and resource coffers. SPARROWS believe that Morden and Amadeus may be hiding somewhere in the Headquarters, so bring them down if possible._

_We have also noted the fact that the Ptolemaic Army is completely absent from the vicinity of the Headquarters other than their mechanized units. As such, we will attempt to track them down and find out if they have anything else planned, considering what they pulled off last time they were active. Until then, you are to focus your attention on the Rebel Army and Amadeus Syndicate forces in the Headquarters._

_Regular Command has picked up an energy reading that is not too different than what is emitted by the Cabrakan from the time when the Regular Army's recruits were sent on an island that later turned out to be a Rebel base. As the original Cabrakan is meant to be a reusable weapon of mass destruction, you must use caution and do all you can to take down the possibly upgraded version in the Headquarters._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

**MISSION ELEVEN START!**

Unlike their previous missions, the Red Eagles and Marines were not met with any resistance when they entered the RAP Joint Force's Headquarters. Instead, the only thing to greet them from within the Headquarters is a normal gust of wind, not a single enemy soldier, vehicle or mechanized unit can be seen.

"Just... where is everyone?" Flynn wondered out loud as he looked around the Headquarters.

"Probably all bunched up in the deeper portions of the base, waiting to get the jump on us." Ash said. "Wouldn't be much of a trouble anyway, thanks to the Ammo Boxes they conveniently left behind. The grey-clad Red Eagle then points at the bunch of Ammo Boxes that are laid in front.

The Mercenaries all looked a the Ammo Boxes, then at each other, and then back at the Ammo Boxes.

"You guys thinking what I'm thinking?" Jenny asked the others.

"Of course!" Everyone answered in unison.

...

After getting everything they need from the Ammo Boxes, the Mercenaries proceeds to blast their way through the next door they come across, making their presence known to the entire RAP Joint Force Headquarters.

"Bring it!" Jason called out with a taunt.

The first group of enemies to respond to that taunt is a pair of Rebel Shield Soldiers backed by several Rebel Riflemen and Mortar Soldiers, whom wasted no time in setting up their formation before beginning their attack.

"Leave this to me~" Mina said as she uses the **Zantetsu Sword** obtained from earlier to deflect the rifle bullets and mortar shells out of the air. The razor wind produced by the slash also reaches just far enough to take out the first Rebel Shield Soldier, with the razor wind penetrating the shield like hot knife through butter.

"Not fast enough, dear!" Ash told the Japanese girl before moving in and taking out the remaining Rebels with three shots from his **Grenade Launcher**, the first shot for the second Rebel Shield Soldier, and the second and third for the Riflemen and Mortars.

Having her kills stolen, Mina turned around and threw a light punch at Ash's direction, which he hardly flinches from. "Baka! You've ruined my glorious moment!"

Ash scratches his head and said, "Is that really something to complain about?"

Another group of enemies soon comes to take the place of the original ones. This time, a Girida-O sandwiched between two Melty Honeys.

"You know what to do, Ash..." Jason said.

"Of course!" Ash responded as he fires his **Grenade Launcher** at the first Melty Honey, blowing it and its driver to smithereens.

The Girida-O and second Melty Honey interrupts the Mercenaries by firing tank shells and missiles at them.

The tank shells are easily avoided due to the Girida-O overestimating its aiming angle, and thus overshot the Mercenaries. The missiles were dealt with by Mina's **Zantetsu Sword**.

"Now it's time to let the marines shine, kids!" Flynn announced hammily to the Red Eagles, before he unleashes a puff of his **Flame Shot** on the Girida-O.

Tanks by their nature don't handle fire-based weapons too well, and the Girida-O is one such case, in which the flame set off its remaining ammo prematurely and blew it up on the spot.

The second Melty Honey was about to fire off another set of missiles, but was then stopped by Leon firing his **Shotgun** at it. The **Shotgun** didn't do enough damage to destroy the open-cockpit tank, but it did take out the Rebel Soldier driving it.

"And that is why open-cockpit vehicles are very risky to operate in a war zone..." The Chinese-American Marine quipped.

...

The Mercenaries moved on to the next room afterwards. There, they encountered an upward slope that has a Sarubia parked at the very top of it.

"I know this tactic..." Jenny told the others. "A Sarubia will often park at the top of a slope, wherein they will let gravity accelerate their rolling bombs down to make them much harder to dodge."

A mini-blimp with a platform soon descended into the room, and hovered several feet above the slope. Two Rebel Bazooka Soldiers are perched on the small platform.

"And they will always send in reinforcements to support the Sarubia in question, for good measure." Jenny finishes her analysis.

Ash just starts off the fight by firing his **Grenade Launcher** at the Bazooka Soldiers, blowing both of them up. "Now that Sarubia is alone!"

The Sarubia then starts dropping rolling mines onto the slope, which then rolls down toward the Mercenaries faster than if they had been dropped on flat ground. The Mercenaries stayed at the bottom of the slope, firing their weapons at the Sarubia while timing their jumps to dodge the rolling mines.

After taking enough hits, the Sarubia fell apart before exploding in a large fireball.

"Now that's what I wanted to see!" Jason said.

No sooner than a second later that another Sarubia came to replace the one before it. This one is accompanied by several Amadeus Syndicalist fast-roping down from above.

Flynn rushed himself to the top of the slope and quickly delivered a Berserk Punch to the new Sarubia, which nocked the tall tank over, essentially mission-killing it. "Denied, you bitch!"

The other Mercenaries quickly finishes the Amadeus Syndicalist with their melee weapons.

After that, a Future Sarubia appeared on the top of the slope, followed by several Future Jetpack Soldiers.

Flynn attempts another Berserk Punch on the Future Sarubia, but the futuristic tall tank weathered it quite well...

...And was able to retaliate by deploying an explosive drone that wastes no time making a mad dash toward the American Marine.

"Yikes!" Flynn exclaimed in surprise, dodging the explosive drone at the last minute and watching it crawling down toward the others.

The explosive drone was only then stopped by Mina's **Zantetsu Sword**.

"We've had problems with our first Future Sarubia too, buddy." Jason told Flynn, while firing his **Heavy Machine Gun** at the Future Jetpack Soldiers. "The tip is to stay as far away from it as possible, especially when you deliver the killing blow, because this thing's like a piñata full of bombs."

Upon finishing his explanation, Jason took a step back to avoid a Future Jetpack Soldier who was shot down by Leon's **Shotgun**.

"Basically, just be careful around these bastards." The Red Eagles leader finishes as he jumps up into the air to slash at a Future Jetpack Soldier with his Machete.

Acknowledging what Jason just told him, Flynn took several steps back as he notices the Future Sarubia about to deploy another explosive drone.

Then, as soon as the Future Sarubia deploys an explosive drone, Flynn aimed and fired his **Flame Shot** at the explosive drone, burning it hot enough that it went off in a big explosion prematurely. The same explosion also took out the Future Sarubia by tearing a large chunk of its hull off.

"Watch out for the bugs!" Jenny shouted at Flynn, pointing at the cluster of explosive drones that hopped out of the wrecked Future Sarubia.

Flynn manages to avoid being blown up by firing his **Flame Shot** at the explosive drones while running backwards... and now the American Marine found himself backing straight into the business end of a Future Jetpack Soldier's Laser Cannon.

The Future Jetpack Soldier was able to fire a shot at Flynn before being gunned down by Jason.

"Ow!" Flynn yelped in pain as the Laser Cannon shot grazed his shoulder. Luckily for him, its only a slight graze that didn't hurt him very much. "First time in a decade that I've got hurt."

"Luckily, it was no big deal for you." Leon told Flynn. "But for anyone else, they will be forced to abandon the mission because getting hit with a laser weapon is never a joke."

"Yeah, yeah, I get it, buddy..." Flynn deadpans as he recuperates. "Now that we're done here, can we please move on?"

...

The Red Eagles and Marines moved on to the next room. One that has an unusually large amount of Supervisory Cameras hanging off the ceiling.

"Wouldn't be much of a problem here..." Ash commented.

Several Patrol Robots appeared from behind a cargo container situated at the opposite end of the room.

"Still not much of a problem." Jason added in.

A Ptolemaic MG Unit jumped out from behind the cargo container and positioned itself on top of it.

"Now that's a bit of a problem..." Jenny pointed out.

The Patrol Robots and Supervisory Cameras were easily dealt with, the former by shooting them in their camera lenses, the latter were fragile to begin with.

The MG Unit, on the other hand, proved to be a problem, as it was continuously keeping the Mercenaries at bay with suppressive fires.

Mina ran toward the MG Unit, using her **Zantetsu Sword** to deflect the bullets as she approaches it. By the time she gets close enough to the MG Unit to chop it up, which she did, the **Zantetsu Sword** broke immediately afterwards.

"You don't see melee weapons very much in those Bullet Hell games. Right, Ash-_kun_?" Mina turns around and asked.

"I don't play anyone of those games, but I'm pretty sure they don't..." Ash replies.

Flynn and Leon quickly overtakes the Red Eagles.

"Leave your dates until after we put the RAP's leaders behind bars, or in hell, whichever comes first." Flynn told the Red Eagles.

An Armored Unit suddenly appeared from behind the Mercenaries and charged toward them like a bulldozer.

The Armored Unit barreled through the Red Eagles like bowling pins, knocking them all over the room. The same would've happened to the Marines, were it not for Flynn stopping the Armored Unit with a well-timed Berserk Punch (which also knocked the spiked mask loose), followed by Leon unloading two **Shotgun** shells into it point blank, finishing it off.

"Oh, that hurts!" Jason exclaimed while picking himself up from the metallic floor.

"Should've seen that dirty trick coming!" Jenny complained, while also picking herself up.

"All those running and shooting in _Left 4 Dead 2_, only to fall for the very same attack in reality..." "Ash sulked, pushing himself out of the dent that was created on the wall when he got barreled through by the Armored Unit.

Mina wasn't knocked over, but getting bulldozed by the Armored Unit still hurts a lot, although all that the Japanese girl said in response is an unhappy "Ite..." [Ouch...]

After that is done, the Mercenaries looked around the room to make sure there are no other enemies waiting in ambush. They then proceed toward the next room with no further adieu.

...

The next room turned out to be a barely lit one, and as soon as the Mercenaries stepped into it, the bulkhead closed behind them, ridding the already dim room of the tiny amount of lights shone into it.

"I've been in barely lit rooms before..." Flynn said. "But never to the point of being unable to see shit..."

That being said, the pitch black room is immediately lit up by several bright light sources dotted all over it.

Now the Mercenaries can see that they are in a room that's taller than it is long. The bulkhead on the opposite end of the room is also sealed shut...

...And hanging off the ceiling is the Rebel Army's earthquake-spawning doomsday machine - the Cabrakan. It is idle at the moment, though.

"Well, guys. Looks like we just stumbled upon one of the RAPs' trump cards..." Jason deadpanned.

The Mercenaries looked around the room.

"I was expecting someone to come try and gloat at us anytime now..." Leon said, cocking his **Shotgun** as he gets ready for a fight.

Sure enough, someone did come to gloat at the Mercenaries. Well, not physically, but no doubt that is what the holographic projection in front of them plan to.

"Geez, its Colonel Gyllendal from the Everest Outpost..." Ash deadpanned.

"Colonel who?" Flynn became confused, as he and Leon have yet to join the Red Eagles back at the Everest Outpost mission.

The holographic projection of Gyllendal let out an evil chuckle. _"You remember me like elephants, Red Eagles. I have to say, I am quite impressed by how you bunch easily wrecked the Wall Crawler. Allen Overlord wants you to know that he is... not happy about it..."_

"Yeah, shut your trap, you bunch of human-shaped light particles..." Jenny attempts to interrupt Gyllendal by thrusting her Taser at him, despite knowing that the Rebel commander is just a hologram at the moment.

"Allen Overlord?" Jason noted the name mentioned. "You mean that guy who was seen jumping out of the Wall Crawler when we wrecked it?"

_"Yes..."_ Gyllendal retains his calmness as he answers. _"But more precisely, the Ptolemaic Army created him in the image of the Devil's Sergeant. Perhaps a full introduction should be arranged..."_

As Gyllendal finishes his sentence, another hologram appeared next to the Rebel commander's. The person depicted in this new hologram wears what looked like a high-tech suit of armor, complete with a _Robocop_-esque helmet (including the single visor) crossed with a gas mask, but stands in a stance similar to Allen O'Neil, and even has a similar laugh (although its hard to tell whether that voice is real or synthesized due to the gas mask).

"Him?" Jenny notes. "Looks like an imitation of Allen to me..."

_"But he is stronger, tougher, faster, smarter..."_ Gyllendal continues...

...Only to be indirectly interrupted by Allen Overlord declaring to the Mercenaries, _"GO HOME TO MOMMY!"_

_"...And might I add... Louder, and hammier..."_ Gyllendal goes on with his sentence.

Allen Overlord gave the Mercenaries the pointer finger and declares loudly, _"I'LL BE WAITING FOR YOU KIDS!"_ before his holographic projection disappears.

The Mercenaries just stood there, silently snarking at the loudmouth that is Allen Overlord.

"You are right." Mina broke the silence and told Gyllendal. "He is louder and hammier."

Gyllendal can be seen looking over his shoulder, but since the hologram only showed him, there's no way to tell what he was looking at just now.

_"Anyway, that is all I have to say to you for now..."_ The Rebel commander continues. _"I have but one word for you before I leave: balance."_

After finishing his sentence, Gyllendal's holographic projection disappeared into the ethers.

"Balance?" Jason took note of that word. "I think I know what he's talking about..."

The Red Eagles and Marines looked up, and finds that the Cabrakan has been activated. The red core that served as its Achilles' Heel is glowing, and the doomsday weapon has also started moving on its own.

"That was to be expected, since we're told to destroy it..." Jenny deadpanned. "And that's exactly what we'll do."

**BOSS BATTLE: _Cabrakan_.**

The Cabrakan starts off the battle by deploying a dozen One-Eye Drones, which then flies all over the room while firing energy pellets at the Mercenaries.

In such a narrow room, avoiding being hit is easier said than done, even if the One-Eye Drones are not very accurate with their shots.

"Take this!" Flynn then fires his **Flame Shot** at the One-Eye Drones multiple times, taking out most of them.

The remaining two One-Eye Drones made the mistake of closing their distance with the Mercenaries, and got torn to shreds by Jason's Vulcan Chop.

"Now, go for its core!"

The Red Eagles and Marines trained their weapons on the Cabrakan's glowing red core, and unload their weapons on it. But hitting the core is not so easy, especially when the rest of the machine it sits on is immune to damage. Even after the Mercenaries have fully exhausted the ammunitions of their weapons, the Cabrakan has hardly taken any significant damage overall.

The doomsday weapon's red core then begins to glow brightly, before firing off a series of laser beams that bounced all over the room.

"Yikes! Now this is what I hated!" Ash exclaimed as he and the others tries to avoid the bouncing lasers. "Projectiles all over the place and very little room for evasive maneuvers!"

The Mercenaries managed to avoid the bouncing lasers until they expire and fades away. They seized the opportunity to fire their handguns at the red core, this time landing quite an amount of hit but still nowhere near significant enough.

The Cabrakan's red core stopped glowing as it open the same compartment that deploys One-Eye Drones, but this time, the opening appear to emit a faint glow of its own along with an indescribable humming.

"You guys might want to hug yourself against the walls for this next attack..." Jenny told the others, as she presses herself against the bulkhead where everyone entered the room from.

The other Mercenaries did the same, just as the Cabrakan fires a large laser beam directly downwards. Said laser beam can only hit the center of the room due to the Cabrakan being incapable of moving sideways, but makes that up by triggering a localized earthquake that almost shook the Mercenaries off their feet. Unlike the original Cabrakan, the earthquake beam fired by this upgraded version is intense enough to cause girders and all sorts of debris to rain down from the ceiling.

Luckily for the Mercenaries, none of the debris landed anywhere near them. So all they did was standing still and waiting out the earthquake beam.

After it is done with the earthquake beam, the Cabrakan took so long to reset that it was just enough for the Mercenaries to pelt its red core with bullets after bullets.

All those hits have dealt enough damage to the red core to spawn a noticeable crack over its surface.

"I think its working!" Flynn announces.

"And if I remember the recruits' after-mission reports correctly, this is also when the thing starts acting more aggressively." Leon pointed out.

Sure enough, the Cabrakan starts off its second phase by deploying a dozen One-Eye Drones, while accompanying it with a barrage of bouncing lasers.

"Oh, come on!" Ash complained furiously.

Taking out the One-Eye Drones became extremely difficult because the Mercenaries now have to avoid the bouncing lasers at the same time. But they manage to do so anyway.

"We need to take it out before things become too difficult for us!" Jason told the others.

The Mercenaries then continues firing their handguns at the Cabrakan's red core.

The doomsday weapon once again readies its earthquake beam, but this time it fired bouncing lasers all over the room as suppressive fire while the earthquake beam is getting ready.

"Give he a hand." Mina said to Ash as she hatches a plan in her mind.

Ash quickly figures out what Mina is planning. "You want me to help you get up close and personal with the thing's weak spot?"

"Of course!" The Japanese girl confirms, while narrowly dodging two bouncing lasers that came her way. "I need to do it before we all die!"

"Okay!" Ash acknowledges. "But I hope it works!"

As that is said, the grey-clad Red Eagle grabbed Mina, and with all the strength he could muster, tossed her upwards toward the Cabrakan's red core.

Although that still isn't high enough, as Mina found herself reaching just short of the doomsday weapon's Achilles' Heel before she starts falling back toward the floor.

Good thing Leon noticed Mina and jumped up to catch her in time. "I'll help you!" The Chinese-American Marine then does an extremely weaken version of his Faux Argentine Backbreaker to help Mina get closer to the Cabrakan's red core.

This time, she gets close enough to her target to stab it with her katana.

"Bye bye~"

Mina drives her katana all the way into the Cabrakan's red core, which is then followed by an intense amount of sparks being emitted from it before the glass part of the core shatters. After that, the doomsday weapon exploded from within, with enough force to tear away a large chunk of its supposedly indestructible hull.

_**Cabrakan**_** defeated****.**

Mina then swiftly lands on the floor on her two feet, before sheathing her katana gracefully.

"Way to go, Mina!" Ash congratulated.

Before anything else can be said, Mina dropped face-first on the floor.

"So tiring~" She said in fatigue.

"Oh well, at least we're safe... for now." Jason said as he sits down on the floor. "Let's rest here for a few minutes. Then we get back to our mission, okay?"

...

After spending five minutes having a rest, the Mercenaries continued their trek deeper into the RAP Joint Force Headquarters. After Flynn smashes through the bulkhead with several rounds of his Berserk Punch, of course.

Almost immediately, they are attacked by a large mob of Rebel Fanatic Soldiers coming from the opposite end of the room, lunging at the Mercenaries with their knives raised.

"Leave this to me, guys!" Jason told the others, as he moves in and chopped through the mob of Rebel Fanatic Soldiers with a series of Vulcan Chops.

Jenny quickly notices that there's something else hiding within the mob of Rebel Fanatic Soldiers. "Be careful!" She called out as she fired a single shot from her handgun into the mob.

A Rebel's death cry can be heard coming from within the mob, followed by a rifle being tossed into he air that then falls back down.

"There are Rebel Riflemen hiding in the mob!" Jenny told Jason.

"Got it! I'll be careful of them!" Jason replied, as he continues to Vulcan Chop through the relentless mob of Rebel Fanatic Soldiers.

More Rebel Riflemen had snuck themselves into the mob, but unfortunately for them, the Mercenaries still noticed them and took them out from a distance.

After about a hundred Rebel Fanatic Soldiers and Riflemen in total (and the Mercenaries wondering how on earth did Morden recruit so many soldiers), they noticed that they are nearing the end of the relentless mob, and that there's a LV Armor at the end of it.

As soon as the Mercenaries are done with the mob, the LV Armor made itself noticeable by firing an explosive shell at them.

The Mercenaries dodged the shell by simply stepping sideways, and then retaliates by pelting the LV Armor's pilot with handgun bullets. There is no questioning that the LV Armor is out of commission with its pilot dead.

...

On to the next room, which isn't that big in itself, the Mercenaries are immediately attacked by two Melty Honeys - one of which somehow appeared from behind them - that are backed by several Amadeus Syndicalist fast-roping down from above.

"Okay, where did this guy come from?" Ash lampshaded as he offs the driver of the Melty Honey behind everyone with a head shot.

"That's the strange part of military operations, so don't think about it much, buddy..." Jason told him, as he attacks the group of Amadeus Syndicalist with his Machete.

The second Melty Honey was able to fire a few missiles, but those were quickly shot out of the air by the Mercenaries. The driver of that Melty Honey is also killed via headshot just seconds later.

The Amadeus Syndicalist are easily dealt with soon after.

"You idiots are useless!" Flynn mocked the pile of Amadeus Syndicalist corpses.

...

The first thing the Mercenaries encounter in the next room is a Future Bradley, which got the jump on them as it fires its propellant-lacking missiles right away.

The Mercenaries notices it in time, and dodges the barrage by standing as far away from it as possible.

"Whew, that was a close one..." Jenny said.

Flynn flexed his knuckles as he takes a step forward. "Stand back, kids. I'll take this one!"

Taking the window of opportunity from when the Future Bradley is adjusting its aim, the American Marine charged forward, ready to deliver a Berserk Punch to the futuristic missile tank... when something made him stop just short of it.

A Rebel Walker, with its knife fully extended, had suddenly appeared in between him and the Future Bradley. The knife has penetrated Flynn's body armor, but did not go all the way through it.

"Tough luck, little guy..." Flynn said before he continues delivering his Berserk Punch, taking out both the Rebel Walker and the Future Bradley.

More Rebel Walkers soon entered the room in a flood, so much that Flynn had no room to act, and is forced to rejoin the other Mercenaries.

"I just hate it when they sent out large numbers of very tough enemies..." Jason complained. "Even more so when we only have handguns and melee weapons with us, and when Grenades are a luxury..."

The Mercenaries proceeds to unload their handguns at the flood of Rebel Walkers, while at the same time avoiding the shots coming from the Rebel Walkers' mini-satellites. The Rebel Walkers that closes in to the Mercenaries are smashed apart by their melee weapons, albeit with some difficulty due to the attack robots' tough armor and large numbers.

It took the Mercenaries five whole minutes to deal with the flood of Rebel Walkers. At some point in the fight, they had to use a few Grenades to be able to take out the Rebel Walkers that are about to successfully shoot them. By the end of it, Mina is the only one with a single Grenade left, and everyone else had fully exhausted their supply of it.

"Maybe we should save this one... for emergency?" Mina wondered while looking at the team's very last Grenade which she held in her hand.

"Do save it for emergencies, dear..." Ash told her. "With this many tough enemies just now, my video gaming instinct tells me that a boss battle is coming right up..."

...

Location: Chrono Embarkation Room, RAP Joint Force Headquarters.

Ash was sort of right, the next room the Mercenaries stepped foot in housed the Chrono Gate, which is how the Future Rebels and their equipment arrived in the present day in the first place. For the moment, only a few Future Rebel Soldiers are in the room.

Those few Future Rebel Soldiers hardly pose any threat due to their small numbers. The Mercenaries plowed through them as they approached the base of the Chrono Gate.

A Morden Robot can be seen operating the computer that controlled the Chrono Gate. As soon as it sees the Mercenaries, the Morden Robot raised its bazooka and started firing at them from behind it.

The fight with the Morden Robot was pretty anti-climatic: the Red Eagles and Marines just surrounded it from all direction, and unloaded handgun bullets into it. After the Morden Robot's bazooka bloated comically and exploded right in its face, Ash charged forward and drove his Chainsaw into its body. As the Morden Robot detaches its head in response, Ash grabbed it from the air and threw it straight into the Chrono Gate, before he steps back to let the headless body explode in a shower of android debris.

"I ain't gonna let another Morden Robot's detached head laugh at me!" Ash shouted loudly in a taunting manner.

"So I guess we're supposed to shut down this portal, do we?" Flynn asked.

"I think so, and I think destroying that computer will contribute to it." Leon answered.

Without saying anything else, the Mercenaries all ganged up on the computer with their melee weapons, and destroys it in exactly one second.

Although destroying the computer doesn't seem to do anything notable to the Chrono Gate. It was still open.

Before the Mercenaries can make any comments on the matter, a dark-shaded Rebel Di-Cokka entered the Chrono Embarkation Room. The Di-Cokka stopped next to what is left of the computer, and the hatch popped open from within to reveal Donald Morden - the real deal - himself.

"Ha Ha Ha Ha!" Morden laughed at what the Mercenaries just did. "You bunch did the exact same thing that Marco Rossi and his bunch did!"

The Mercenaries looked at what is left of the computer, then back at the Devil Rebirth himself.

"The same thing the Regular Commandos did?" Leon wondered.

"Oh, damn! Now I remember!" Jenny suddenly exclaims. "When the Regular Commandos encountered the Chrono Gate back at Garbage Island, destroying the controlling computer actually disabled its safety mode, allowing it to start defending itself!"

That led to the other Red Eagles face-palming.

Morden laughed in a taunting manner before continuing. "That's right! I was expecting you Mercenaries to repeat what Marco Rossi and his bunch did the first time, and you did!"

Flynn charged himself toward Morden and his dark-shaded Di-Cokka, intent on taking out the Devil Rebirth with a Berserk Punch. The American Marine does deliver his attack, only to find that although Morden and his tank isn't a hologram, the punch phased right through him harmlessly.

"What...?! But how?!" Flynn became confused.

"All thanks to some advanced future technology that I don't understand myself!" Morden taunted again. "But enough talk! Let us make this fun, shall we?"

**BOSS BATTLE: _Chrono Gate_.**

As soon as Morden finishes his sentence, the Chrono Gate emitted an empowering whirr, followed by about five large glowing orbs forming at the top of the Gate's event horizon.

"These are what the men from the future refer to as Neutron Cannonballs!" Morden said, as he waves his right hand in a commanding manner. "Take this!"

Morden's gesture command sent the Neutron Cannonballs hurling toward the Mercenaries.

The Mercenaries quickly rolled out of the way, knowing that touching anyone of these dense energy particles are a guaranteed death for any human being. The one that was sent hurling toward Flynn was avoided by the American Marine, and like his Berserk Punch, the Neutron Cannonball just phased through Morden harmlessly.

"We have to fight this thing?!" Flynn exclaimed while pointing a finger at the Chrono Gate.

"What choice do we have?" Jason answered. "The Regular Commandos also whaled on its previous incarnation with all they've got."

That said, the Red Eagles begin shooting the frame of the Chrono Gate with their handguns.

"Knock knock." Morden decided to chip in by firing a shell from his Di-Cokka at the Red Eagles.

The Red Eagles notice the shot in time, and dodges it by crouching.

"Damn you, Morden!" Ash shouted at the Devil Rebirth. "I'm gonna kick your ass!"

"I'll like to see you try!" Morden responded with a taunt, before giving another commanding gesture to the Chrono Gate.

Several smaller orbs emerged from the center of the event horizon and landed over the room, before forming into Future Rebel Soldiers.

One of the Future Rebel Soldiers was quickly taken out by Leon via a Faux Argentine Backbreaker before he could do anything.

"You Eagles focus on the Gate, we the Marines will deal with possible reinforcements!" The Chinese-American Marine called out.

As the Red Eagles focused their fire on the Chrono Gate, the Marines covered them by distracting the Future Rebel Soldiers away from them.

A Future Rebel Soldier fires a ball lightning from his Tesla helmet at Flynn, who easily dodges it before retaliating with a Berserk Punch. Another Future Rebel Soldier deployed a bouncing bomb from his backpack, which Leon evades by sliding under it, before shooting him in the face with his handgun.

The last Future Rebel Soldier lunged at Leon and hit the Chinese-American Marine in the back with his electrified gloves. But as the Marines' body armor are made to insulate the wearer from electricity as well, it didn't do anything to Leon, who quickly turns around and tossed him into the air via Faux Argentine Backbreaker.

The Chrono Gate released another two orbs, which formed into Future Girida-Os upon landing.

Flynn rushes up to the closest one and delivers a Berserk Punch to it. But since the futuristic mini-tank is much more heavily armored than its present day counterpart, it took the American Marine several Berserk Punches to take it out.

Leon fired his handgun at the second Future Girida-O to draw its attention. He succeed, as the futuristic mini-tank turn its plasma cannon toward him and fires. Leon slid under the plasma cannon rounds to close his distance with the Future Girida-O as well as getting himself into its blind spot. Unable to shoot at Leon as he's in its blind spot, the Future Girida-O moved in reverse to try and get the Chinese-American Marine back in its aiming visor, which was just enough time for Flynn to move in and flip it over with a Berserk Punch directed at the bottom of its chassis.

At about the same time, the Red Eagles had made some progress on attacking the Chrono Gate, in which a small portion of the frame started emitting sparks endlessly due to the damages sustained.

"Argh, you meddling...!" Morden became angered. He performs another commanding gesture, and more Neutron Cannonballs formed over the event horizon and are hurled toward the Mercenaries.

As some of those Neutron Cannonballs are hurled toward the Red Eagles, they had to break formation to get out of the way and avoid being hit.

More Neutron Cannonballs emerged from the event horizon and are hurled toward the Mercenaries, who manages to dodge them.

"Missed us!" Jenny took her opportunity to taunt Morden.

"Why you...!" Morden went from angry to furious, and responds to the taunt by firing another shell from his Di-Cokka, which is still easily dodged by crouching.

The Chrono Gate then releases two new orbs, which didn't land anywhere in the Chrono Embarkation Room, but rather formed into Future Masknells in mid-air.

"Leave the birds to us Marines, kids!" Flynn told the Red Eagles. "Although you still want to watch out for stray shots."

"We will!"

With that said, the Red Eagles resumed firing at the part of the Chrono Gate that is endlessly emitting sparks.

The two Future Masknells started with an attempt to fire at the Red Eagles. But one had its tail rotor shot by the Marines to the point that the entire futuristic helicopter started auto-rotating, before crashing into the back side of the room. The second Future Masknell did manage to fire several rounds of energy pellets at the Red Eagles, only for them to quickly move out of the way, before it too has its tail rotor shot up and promptly crash into the Chrono Gate.

The Chrono Gate released a single orb this time, which formed into a Future R-Shobu in midair.

"Aw, shit, this one can't be good..." Jason noted the fact that the latest reinforcement is a Future R-Shobu.

The Future R-Shobu actually went and dropped plasma bombs on the Red Eagles, forcing them to disperse to avoid being hit.

"Man, this one is smart!" Jenny exclaimed.

The Future R-Shobu continued to drop plasma bombs on the Red Eagles, and isn't budging even as the Marines are shooting it with their handguns.

"Yeah, I know!" Ash responded to Jenny's exclamation. "It's trying to stop us from attacking the Gate!"

With no other choice, all six Mercenaries focused their fire on the Future R-Shobu while avoiding its plasma bombs and missiles. It took over a hundred rounds to finally bring down that futuristic attack chopper.

"Damn..." Flynn pointed out. "I expected many things to be as resilient, if not more than, a heavy tank, but a helicopter was not one of them..."

"I've had enough of you government-hired pigs!" Morden shouted at the Mercenaries to grab their attention. "Taste the best of the Future Rebel Army!"

Two more orbs emerged from the Chrono Gate. These two landed on the opposite ends of the room, and respectively formed into a Future Bradley and Future Sarubia.

Mina did not say anything, but one can still see that the Japanese girl is trembling in fear at the notion of having to face these two futuristic war machines at the same time.

An encounter with a Future Bradley or Future Sarubia is already problematic enough for the Mercenaries, and having to face both at the same time is most definitely worse. Firstly, the Future Bradley firing large amounts of propellant-lacking missiles at a high rate with no firing preparations needed makes jumping a risky move; secondly, the Future Sarubia is problematic in that its projectiles literally crawls on the ground and are only avoidable by jumping, the option of which is taken away by the aforementioned Future Bradley; lastly, the two firing at the same time would absolutely prevent anyone from closing in on either war machines.

"Oh, shit..." Even Leon cursed at the situation.

Sure enough, the AI housed within the Future Sarubia and Future Bradley decided to both attack at the same time, severely limiting if not completely annihilating the Mercenaries' chances of getting through this situation.

The Mercenaries had to get as close to the Future Bradley as they can to avoid its propellant-lacking missile barrage, while focusing their firepower to take out any explosive drones that comes their way from the Future Sarubia.

"Uh, I think its about time we make our emergency weapon useful..." Ash told the others, trying his best to not let Morden hear him.

"Emergency weapon?" Mina was the one to respond, and a confused one at that. But the Japanese girl quickly catches on to the main point. "Oh, that emergency weapon!"

Mina grabbed hold of the last Grenade in the Mercenaries' arsenal, and was about to throw it at the Future Sarubia before being stopped by Flynn.

"No, these stick bombs won't make a dent in that thing, considering that one of them weathered my Berserk Punch quite well." Flynn told her, before pointing at the Chrono Gate...

...Specifically, the part that is emitting sparks endlessly.

"That is a better target for it." Flynn continued. "Now do it quick before we're toast!"

Taking the opportunity of when the Future Bradley adjusts its aim, Mina quickly stood up, and with all the arm strength she has, tossed the last Grenade at the Chrono Gate.

Morden instantly knows what is about to happen. "NOOOOOOO!" He cried out when he sees the Grenade being hurled toward the damaged part of the Chrono Gate.

BOOM! The Grenade exploded upon contact with the damaged part of the Chrono Gate. The explosion tore a chunk of the Gate's frame right off, causing the portal to start to destabilize.

The destabilization of the Chrono Gate sent out huge bolts of electricity that flew all over the Chrono Embarkation Room, two of which disintegrated the Future Bradley and Future Sarubia on contact.

_**Chrono Gate**_** defeated.**

The other bolts of electricity flew all over the room and tore up a large chunk of it, enough that the ceiling has started to crumble.

Morden watched hopelessly as the Chrono Embarkation Room and the Chrono Gate itself begins to fall apart. "Curse you, Red Eagles and Marines! This isn't over yet! The Regular Army and President Balthazar Drippiek's administration are still going to pay for the death of my son, even if I have to do it FROM HELL!"

A bolt of electricity flew out from the destabilizing Chrono Gate and hit Morden's Di-Cokka square on. Whatever piece of future technology that allowed him to phase through attacks must've been shorted out by the bolt, as indicated by the tank erupting in an explosion that catapulted the Devil Rebirth straight toward the destabilizing event horizon of the Chrono Gate.

"YOU WILL REMEMBER THIIIIIISSSSSS!" Morden screamed at the top of his lungs before he plummeted into the event horizon and went right through it, which then fully destabilizes and collapsed into an orb of light that shrinks continuously for the next minute...

...And then explodes in an eye-blinding blast of light.

The Mercenaries turned away from the Chrono Gate to avoid being blinded by the eye-blinding light, but the explosion also sent out a shockwave that while non-fatal, is still strong enough to knock all six Mercenaries down.

After the eye-blinding flash fades away, the Mercenaries picked themselves up from the floor. Looking around the Chrono Embarkation Room, they found it to be in ruins, and that there's no trace of neither the Chrono Gate nor Morden himself.

"Did we... do it?" Jason wondered.

"Kill off General Donald Morden for good?" Jenny enquired.

"No way he's gonna survive being thrown into the Gate, especially when its in the middle of destabilizing!" Ash declared.

"Then he is dead for good~!" Mina joins in on the declaration.

"Finally, that son-of-a-bitch is gone for good!" Flynn cheered in excitement, and celebrates by delivering an ordinary punch to what is left of Morden's dark-shaded Di-Cokka.

Leon slowly approaches the dark-shaded Di-Cokka, looks at it for a while, then takes off his cap in an honoring motion and said, "Amen..."

**MISSION COMPLETE!**

"So now what?" Jason raised a question. "Now that Morden's dead, and the Future Rebels can't come to the present day anymore... Furthermore, how on earth do we get out of this place?"

Before anyone can answer the Red Eagles leader's question, an explosion coming from above the ceiling blasted a large chunk of concrete out of it, and what appeared to be a spotlight and the sounds of helicopter propellers flooded into the Chrono Embarkation Room from that hole.

"What's going on?!" Ash exclaimed.

"The Regular Army came to fetch us. maybe?" Flynn guessed.

The Regular Hi-Do and another CH-47 Chinook bearing the Regular Army's emblem then descends into the room from that very same hole.

"Yep..." Flynn added.

The side door of the Regular Hi-Do opened, and out came someone none of the Mercenaries were expecting.

"Hey, you all!" Eri Kasamoto called out to the Mercenaries from the Regular Hi-Do. "Thanks for stealing our job!"

Another Regular Commando appeared next to Eri. It was Tarma.

"We've found exactly where the Ptolemaic Army are..." Tarma told the Mercenaries. "And seems that they are up to their occult business again..."

Jenny was the one to step up first. The blue-haired Red Eagle first said to Eri, "That's the respect we get? You spotlight-hogging bi..." And then to Tarma, "But what about Amadeus? We didn't see him anywhere in the base!"

"That guy, Amadeus? He tried to get away in a jet before you bunch came, but our guys at Brazil shot him down and arrested him on the spot." Eri replied to Jenny. "Now get your butts over here, because we still have a devil-worshipping secret society to take down!"

The Mercenaries just sighed as they slowly approached the Chinook and boarded it.

"Like I said, spotlight-hogging bi..." Jenny said to the other Mercenaries.

* * *

**Afterwords**

Oh wow, that took a lot longer than expected. Got into so much details for the boss battles that this chapter ended up taking three weeks to finish.

The Chrono Gate got destroyed, and no Kraken came out of it? Don't worry, the Kraken will appear in a later chapter, even though the Mercenaries have only the Ptolemaic Army left to deal with now...

And you know what? No updates have arrived to _Metal Slug Defense_ in the past three weeks. _Metal Slug Attack_, on the other hand, got updated a couple of times, and I have only one message to deliver to SNK Playmore...

"Don't care about your plans to earn big bucks by promoting an extremely overpowered Leona. Nobody wants to pay so much real money just to have fun..."

Oh, and Allen Overlord is actually what the developers of the fan game _Metal Slug 5 Elite_ calls the controller of the Wall Crawler, whom they developed as an entire character in said fan game. Special thanks to them for developing Allen Overlord as a character.

Boss buff list:

Cabrakan - It sends out more of those One-Eye Drones at a time, and at a faster rate too. It also fires more of those bouncing lasers at a time, as well as its earthquake beam actually causing a big enough earthquake to shake harmful debris down from the ceiling of the arena. Interesting enough, it also got nerfed in a sense that it never used those slow-firing energy orb things at any point in this battle.

Chrono Gate - It fired those huge orbs - which I call Neutron Cannonballs - at a faster rate, rather than one at a time. It also sent out a Future R-Shobu, Future Bradley, and Future Sarubia, which you won't encounter when fighting it in _Metal Slug 7_. And Although this one technically isn't a buff to the Gate itself, you can definitely see Morden taking the occasional pot shot at the Mercenaries while they fought the Chrono Gate, and in MS7 he just sits there and laughs at you while you fight it.

Shout-out index:

"...Falcon PUNCH!" - Captain Falcon called, he wants his trademark punch back.

"..._Left 4 Dead_..." - Looks like Ash agrees that both running and shooting are important in First-Person Shooters. Too bad this is a Platforming Run N Gun...

"..._Robocop_-esque..." - Blame the MS5 Elite dev team for making Allen Overlord's appearance like that. I got no comment on it otherwise...

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	14. Chapter 13: Calling Of Doomsday part 1

**Forewords**

So how long has it been since I last updated _Metal Slug: Mercenaries_? About two months, perhaps...

Now let's get to what I missed about _Metal Slug Defense_/_Attack_.

Unfortunately, its been three months since _Defense_ was last updated, so I guess that means MSD is officially retired. So let's shift the focus on _Attack_.

Focus one - Ralf: Remember when you "borrowed" him in the tutorial stages? Well, now you can keep him in the game for yourself. With all the nerf Leona had suffered in the past months, Ralf became the must-have for every deck if you have unlocked him already.

Focus two - Clark: I totally called him before SNK even announced his addition to the playable roster of MSA. Thankfully, he's not as overpowered as the other two Ikari Warriors.

Focus three - Rugname: Yes, you read that right. The final boss of _Metal Slug 2_/_X_ is now playable in MSA. Although it is only obtainable in the March Extra Ops, and SNK doesn't seem to have any intention of putting it in the Medal/VIP Crank. Its powerful, alright, but the only reason I refused to use it other than its AP cost (1600 at Platinum grade) is the fact that despite being a spaceship hanging out at the top of the screen, the game considers it as a _ground_ unit, so everything would attack it automatically. Because of that, it dies way too quickly despite its 200K+ HP.

Focus four - Prototype Iron: Remember the _Battle Cats_ collaboration event from MSD? Well, the Prototype Iron is the Iron Nokameow _without_ the Cat Base on its flatbed. Too bad I haven't seen it in action very much (doesn't own it, didn't run into anyone owning it during PVP, and didn't watch any Youtube videos that featured it), so I can't give you any additional details about it.

Focus five - the hackers totally had it coming: Finally, SNK decided to do something about the rampant hacking. For those of you who got banned from MSA for hacking, I'll give you only two words: "Git Gud."

And that's it for the recap of MSA's timeline. Now let's get back to the story proper...

* * *

**Chapter 14: Calling Of Doomsday part 1**

Time: 1700 Hour; 31st of December, 2040.

Location: [?], Lima, Peru.

The best way to describe the huge ominous tower of stone that had suddenly appeared in the middle of the streets of Lima, Peru is that... it is a tower made of stone.

None of the Peruvian authorities even have any idea what the structure really was, and how to describe it without sounding delusional. Regardless of what it was, the entirety of Lima has been evacuated shortly after the tower of stone appeared. The Peruvians were not taking any chances, especially considering all the supernatural events that have taken place since the birth of the Rebel Army.

Except that Donald Morden and the Rebel Army totally have nothing to do with this one.

...

Location: Outside Lima's city blocks, Peru.

A few hours have passed by the time the Regular Army's helicopter fleet have arrived at Lima, Peru.

"So let me get this straight..." Jason Wayne said to the Red Eagles and Marines. "The Ptolemaic Army has, with some maybe supernatural means, constructed a big freaking tower in the middle of Lima, Peru, with the intention of summoning the devil or something similar into the world?"

"Well, the Regular Commandos weren't denying the possibility..." Jenny Wakeman replies. "...Given that it was written right in the reports that came after the Regular Army's previous run-in with those Illuminati wannabes."

Flynn 'Mack' Taggart finishes checking his handgun before cutting in, "And because the report also clearly stated the entity in question to be flying, it means we can't get close to the tower by air. Which means..."

Leon Chi-Ming Chan cocks his **Shotgun**. "...We will have to land right outside Lima's city blocks, and approach the tower by land."

The Mercenaries then looks out of the side windows of the helicopter they're in.

"With all the firepower the Ptolemaic may have posted here, I wished Duke Nukem was here with us..." Ash Kingslayer lamented about what he might face down there on the streets of Lima.

"Too bad, this is reality." Mina Kabuto added to the lament.

The Regular Army helicopter fleet then descends, and lands right outside Lima's city blocks.

"Alright, you spotlight-stealing worms, listen up!" Eri Kasamoto shouted at the Mercenaries as everyone got off the helicopters.

The Mercenaries turned toward each other after getting off their helicopter. "Here we go again..." They whispered to one another.

Eri continues with her sentence. "We can't land directly in the city because of the large numbers of these devil worshippers, so we're going to blast our way in by land!"

Tarma Roving appears and cuts off the Memphis Bomb Princess. "Eri, if you're still angry about having our spotlights stolen, now's not the time to lash it out."

Marco Rossi appears alongside Tarma. "Sure, all of us were pissed about it, but we decided just now to leave it aside until we finishes off the RAP Joint Force's members for good."

Eri sighed in disappointment. "Fine, but I'm going to blow them up once we get back to Regular Command!" She then turns toward the Mercenaries. "Now listen closely, you six! My teammates and I will be shooting our way through everything the Ptolemaic may be sending at us, and your job is to take care of whatever we missed! Understood?"

Intimidated by Eri, none of the Mercenaries dared to say anything other than "Crystal clear", except for Mina.

"Question..." The Japanese Red Eagle asked. "How do we get from here to the tower?"

Eri answers with a quick and direct "With these!" and then points toward a direction.

Where Eri pointed, several Slug Mobiles are being airdropped to be used for the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries. There is a problem, though: the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries adds up to a total of 15 people, and there are only six Slug Mobiles.

"Two of these were used in our previous clash with the Ptolemaic Army. We'll use more of these to end them once and for all!" Eri continues. "Now I know that there's 15 of us, and only six of these bad boys. The Ikari Warriors prefers to bash their way in through a different path..."

That said, Clark, Ralf and Leona have already left the scene, as they decided to take a shortcut by trotting through Lima's sewers instead. "See you all at the tower!" Ralf said to everyone before he jumped down the manhole.

"So that makes the 12 of us left, allowing us to split the six Slug Mobiles evenly. Now get going!" Eri finishes her sentence.

The Mercenaries responds with an intimidated "Yes, ma'am!"

...

_**Mission briefing**_

_Congratulations, Red Eagles and Marines. Donald Morden and his Rebel Army are finally killed off for real almost a decade after their first appearance. The Amadeus Syndicate have also collapsed, with their leader apprehended by Regular Army forces. However, now is not the time to celebrate yet._

_The Ptolemaic Army have been located in Lima, Peru. And as you can see, they have erected yet another tower of stone not too different than the one from Hong Kong several years ago, with the intention of summoning the demonic entity dubbed the Evil Spirit Incarnate yet again. You should not need to be told to prevent it at all costs._

_As the Ptolemaic Army knew this is their true last stand, they will be devoting all the firepower they have left to stop us from preventing whatever occult ritual their peers may be performing at the peak of the tower. As such, we will also be deploying all of our resources in putting an end to this secret society once and for all._

_You will begin the final showdown against the Ptolemaic Army by traversing through the highways of Lima, using the weapons of the Slug Mobiles to, as told by Sergeant Kasamoto, shoot down anything the Regular Commandos may have missed. After that, you must provide all the assistant you can to the Regular Commandos, for our surveillance satellites encountered unknown disruptions after locating the enemy and thus leave us blind to exactly what may be down there._

_This mission must be a successful one, for the fate of humanity lies in it..._

_That is all. Godspeed..._

...

**MISSION TWELVE START!**

By the time the Red Eagles and Marines begins their drive through the highways of Lima, the Regular Commandos were already several miles ahead of them. Jenny, Ash and Flynn each commandeered a Slug Mobile while Jason, Mina and Leon served as their respective passengers.

"Remember, guys..." Flynn reminded the other Mercenaries. "There will be a heck ton of Ptolemaic troops in the city, so keep an eye out for anything the Commandos missed."

"Roger!" Everyone responded in unison.

A Cruise Missile suddenly appeared in front of the Mercenaries and are approaching them. They quickly steered clear of its way.

"Whoa, that was a close one!" Ash exclaims. "First I've personally seen a Cruise Missile flying so close to the ground!"

More Cruise Missiles appeared from behind the Mercenaries, and are getting closer to them by the second.

"Let's make this simple, guys..." Jason told the others as he climbed through the sunroof of the Slug Mobile he and Jenny are occupying, manning a Vulcan. "Shoot everything that isn't Regular Army!"

The Mercenaries all fired their Slug Mobiles' build-in Vulcans at the incoming Cruise Missiles. One exploded in mid-air as it took hits to its warhead, while another has its propulsion taken out, sending it crashing into the remaining Cruise Missiles and setting off a chain reaction that blew them all up.

"Oh yeah! Mercenaries one, Ptolemaic zero!" Jason announces.

All of a sudden, explosions erupted all over the highways of Lima, causing part of it to crumble.

It just so happens that the Mercenaries are approaching one of those crumbled parts.

"Hang on! Get ready to jump!" Jenny called out to the others.

The drivers accelerated toward the gap on the highway before using some form of the Slug Mobiles' complex mechanics to jump over it.

"Good thing these cars can jump, otherwise we would've been dead back there." Ash comments.

More Cruise Missiles then approaches from behind the Mercenaries. Only this time, there are a few Ballistic Missiles mixed in too.

"Oh, come on! _Ballistic Missiles_?!" Jason exclaimed. "Just how much overkill are they going for?!"

"I admit I've used the BFG 9000 against normal infantry in my previous tours of duty, but never have I seen Ballistic Missiles being employed against a few people!" Flynn adds in with just as much surprise.

The Mercenaries then unloads their Slug Mobiles' build-in Vulcans at the Cruise Missiles and Ballistic Missiles, taking out a few in the process.

One of the Cruise Missiles slipped through the hail of Vulcan fire and made contact with the Slug Mobile used by Ash and Mina. Luckily for them, the warhead in that Cruise Missile has a faulty detonator, and the contact causes it to become unbalanced as it crashes into a road sign. However, the contact also caused the Slug Mobile to spin out of control, as Ash struggles to regain traction.

Ash regained traction just in time to drive out of the way of another Cruise Missile and then shoot it down with the Vulcan of his Slug Mobile. "Man, that's one hell of a spin..." He said, before turning toward Mina. "You okay, dear?"

Mina became dizzy as a result of the spinning, but otherwise she is fine. "I could go on..."

After shooting down all the Cruise Missiles and Ballistic Missiles, the Mercenaries found themselves approaching yet another wide gap on the highway.

"Everyone, get ready to jump again!" Jenny called out to the others. "This one's wider!"

Everyone held on tight as they accelerated once again, gaining just enough speed to jump over the gap. Flynn and Leon's Slug Mobile barely clears the gap, but the Marines safely made it through, anyway.

"Okay, then. The rest of the highway is unscathed, which means we can continue toward the tower smoothly!" Jason said.

All of a sudden, a Special Force APC crashed through the guard rail of an adjacent highway and landed on the one the Mercenaries are traversing on. This Special Force APC has a vehicle-mounted grenade launcher on top of it.

"We've got company!" Flynn told the others, as he and Leon directs Vulcan fires at the Special Force APC.

The APC aims its mounted grenade launcher and fires several high-caliber grenades at the Mercenaries, whom drives out of the way to avoid being hit.

The Mercenaries then focus their fires on the APC, which blew up after several seconds of sustained fire.

It wasn't very long before two more Special Force APCs arrived at the scene.

"More of these bastards!"

The Mercenaries immediately focus their fires at the APCs while evading high-caliber grenades that are fired at them. One APC took excessive damage to its mounted grenade launcher which set off its remaining ammunitions, while another has both rear tires popped which caused it to spin out of control and crash into a concrete divider.

"Ha! Take that!" Ash quipped.

The Mercenaries are soon greeted by the noise of jet engines coming from all directions - an indication that Ptolemaic air forces are approaching their location.

"Air support approaching! Six o'clock!" Leon warned the others upon seeing a squadron of Ptolemaic Flying Taras.

The Mercenaries slammed on the pedal when the Ptolemaic Flying Taras started dropping bombs on them.

After evading the bombs, the Mercenaries fired back at the squadron of Ptolemaic Flying Taras, downing the entire squadron.

More Ptolemaic Flying Taras quickly arrived to replace the ones that were shot down. These replacements were also quickly shot down after their bombs failed to hit the Mercenaries.

More jets have arrived to attack the Mercenaries. Only this time, the squadron consisted of Ptolemaic Eaca-B.

"Man, these guys just keep on coming..." Jenny lampshaded.

The squadron of Ptolemaic Eaca-B launched missiles at the Mercenaries, which are either evaded or shot out of the air.

After that, the Mercenaries just fired back. Although the Ptolemaic Eaca-B are much more resilient than the Flying Taras, they still quickly went down after several seconds of Vulcan fire.

"Good job, guys." Jason said to everyone. "Now let's get going..."

An Elite Ptolemaic R-Shobu suddenly appears from under the highway, with its high-caliber Gatling gun to bear.

"...After we take out this moron!" Jason finishes his sentence.

The Mercenaries scattered as the Ptolemaic R-Shobu spray shots all over the place. But Flynn didn't steer his Slug Mobile out of the way in time, resulting in a shot tearing the driver-side door right off. Luckily, both Flynn and Leon are unscathed.

"Okay, I never had much chances to put myself behind a steering wheel." Flynn commented. "But when I do..."

The American Marine then presses a button on the dashboard, which activates a missile launcher that is concealed under the hood of the Slug Mobile.

A missile is fired from the launcher, and takes out the Gatling gun of the Ptolemaic R-Shobu.

"...I make sure I have the license to kill." Flynn finishes his one-liner.

With its Gatling gun taken out, the Ptolemaic R-Shobu soon found itself defenseless against a hail of Vulcan bullets fired by the Mercenaries. Soon, the helicopter gets shot up enough that it spun out of control before exploding in midair.

"Alright, we should be arriving at the city's main district in about a minute." Jenny announced to the others. "Which means we'll have to go the rest of the way on foot, because most of the city's collapsed. Rubble's blocking most of the main road."

"Roger!" Everyone else responded.

...

Location: Main District; Lima, Peru.

Jenny was right. Most of the Lima's main roads are either destroyed or covered by rubble, which would've prevented the Slug Mobiles from continuing. The three Slug Mobiles taken by the Regular Commandos were abandoned in front of a massive pile up. Judging by the sound of gunfire, the Regular Commandos have already climbed over the pile-up and started a shootout with the Ptolemaic Army.

The Mercenaries got off their Slug Mobiles, knowing they wouldn't be able to drive through the obstructed roads.

"Remember, our mission is to give the Regular Commandos all the support fire they'll need." Jason reminded everyone. "So let's hurry up."

The Mercenaries took only one step before a sinister and somewhat familiar laughter not unlike Allen O'Neil's assaulted their ears.

_"AHAHAHAHAHA!"_

The Mercenaries knew only one person other than Allen with that laughter. Although they have gotten used to the scenery-chewing by this point, no thanks to the O'Neil father-son duo.

"It's the Ptolemaic's own version of that muscular loudmouth. They call him Allen Overlord, apparently..." Ash comments, bored about the subject in question. "He could be somewhere in this city..."

"Never mind him, Ash-_kun_." Mina told him. "We should focus on our mission, then we can deal with him."

The Mercenaries decided to ignore Allen Overlord's echoing laugh, and proceeds to climb over the pile-up.

Reaching the top of the pile-up, the Mercenaries sees that there are Ptolemaic Guerillas all over the place, with some descending from above with parachutes while firing their SMGs manically at Marco Rossi and Fio Germi whom seem to have fallen behind the rest of the Regular Commandos.

"Geez, that's a lot of guys for a last stand..." Jenny pointed out.

Marco notices the Mercenaries despite having to manage the massive shootout. "You guys were supposed to give us a hand, right?" He then raises his handgun to shoot a Guerilla that lunged at him with a knife. "Because we need that extra hand right now!"

"Alright, we're coming!"

The Mercenaries entered the scene, gunning down enemy forces as they descended from the pile-up.

A Claw Unit suddenly popped out from underneath a nearby pile of debris and lunged at the Mercenaries.

Leon nonchalantly pulls out his **Shotgun** and blasts the Claw Unit before it gets close enough to land a hit on the Mercenaries.

After reaching the bottom of the pile-up, the Mercenaries proceeds to quickly finish off the enemy forces in the vicinity. A Special Force APC was destroyed when Mina tossed a Grenade straight into its doorway, blowing it up.

"Wow, you guys are good..." Marco commented on the Mercenaries' efficiency. "No wonder Regular Command hired you to do our job."

Jenny stares at Marco with a wide-eyed look. "I hope that's not a complain on us stealing your job..."

Before Marco can make his response, Fio poked him in the elbow as if to interrupt him.

"He didn't mean it..." Fio answers Jenny.

"..." Marco then walks toward a nearby subway station entrance, and then stops to urge the others. "Well, come on. We've fallen behind the others. Who knows what troubles they might've found themselves in.

...

Location: Subway Tunnels; Lima, Peru.

The Mercenaries along with Marco and Fio entered the subway station, expecting a lot of resistance to show up and assault them.

Turns out, that wasn't the case, at least not for their side of the subway. The firefight appears to be clustered further down the subway tunnel at another station.

"Must be our guys if the Ptolemaic goons were fighting them." Marco deducted. "Whoever those guys are, they looked like they need help."

Jason reloads his handgun. "We Mercenaries were here to help you Commandos, so that's what we're gonna do!" He then jumps off the platform onto the rails which thankfully doesn't run on electricity. "Let's go, guys!"

Before the rest of the Mercenaries can follow, an Augenstern suddenly appeared from the opposite direction of the subway tunnel and fired its harpoon at the subway station, forcing everyone to jump onto the rails to avoid being skewered.

The retracting of the harpoon causes a whipping of the harpoon line that completely destroys the station platform, as the pilot of the Augenstern reloads it for a second shot.

"Stand back, everyone..." Leon instructed everyone, as he cocks his **Shotgun**. "This one is mine..."

The Chinese-American Marine then charges toward the Augenstern, crouching at the last minute to dodge the harpoon that was fired at him. After getting himself right underneath the Augenstern, Leon jumped up toward the cockpit and fired his **Shotgun** into it point-blank, instantly killing the Ptolemaic Commander piloting the machine.

Marco just stood there jaw-dropped at the sight, while Fio appears to be having a very minor case of fangirling at the same thing.

Flynn gave his friend a thumbs up. "Good one, Leon!"

Marco looked back at the firefight that is occurring further down the subway tunnel, then back at everyone. "We're going to need as much firepower as we can, so someone has to go pilot this thing and support us with it..."

Jenny stepped forward and claimed the Augenstern, by popping open its cockpit hatch from which the dead Ptolemaic Commander fell out. "I'll ride this thing!" The blue-haired female mercenary proclaimed. "Of all the Red Eagles, I'm the most qualified to man Slug vehicles!"

"Then just do it..." Marco told Jenny. He then turns around, and notes that some Hover Units are approaching from the direction of the other station. "...Because we're not alone."

"Right on it!" Jenny said as she hopped into the cockpit of the Augenstern - noting that it was relatively clean despite its previous pilot being offed with a point-blank **Shotgun** blast. "The Vulcans aren't turned on. Activating them now..."

As it turns out, the twin Vulcans were turned off because they have faulty wiring that prevented the targeting systems from functioning properly, which was demonstrated in full force when they starts spraying bullets uncontrollably at every direction.

"Holy shit!" Jason cursed out loud as he jumped to the sides to avoid the bullet spray. So did everybody else present.

The approaching Hover Units were not able to react in time and are all shot down.

Jenny quickly turn off the twin Vulcans again before they cause friendly fires. She quickly locates the faulty wirings, "Man, that was a close one. Guess the Ptolemaics weren't as good at engineering as everyone thought..." and proceeds to fix it using her knowledge on engineering.

"I sure hope so." Marco lamented as he gets up from the ground. He then turns toward Fio. "You alright?"

"I'm okay." Fio answers.

After confirming the faulty wirings have been fixed, Jenny turns on the Augenstern's twin Vulcans again. "Okay, its fixed. Now let's kick some ass!"

"It better be fixed..." Jason said. "Because none of us here wants to be subjected to friendly fire."

As everyone proceeds down the subway tunnel, the Ptolemaic Army would keep on sending troops to engage the Mercenaries and Commandos in combat. They came in the form of Ptolemaic Bradleys, Ptolemaic Girida-Os, Ptolemaic Di-Cokkas, Ptolemaic Slugs, Ptolemaic Landseeks (that are carrying MG Units), Hover Units...

...As well as more Augensterns.

Of course, these enemy units are not too much of a problem thanks to the fixed twin Vulcans of the Augenstern commandeered by Jenny (all the Ptolemaic Augensterns have the same faulty wiring problem that forced their pilots to turn them off) making scrap metals out of them.

As the group neared the other subway station, another Ptolemaic Augenstern was standing by, and it got the jump by firing its harpoon at one of the feet of Jenny's Augenstern, pinning it to the tunnel floor.

"You, get lost!" Jenny angrily taunted the Ptolemaic Augenstern as she unloads Vulcan bullets into it.

After a while of sustained fire, the cockpit of the Ptolemaic Augenstern blew up. No doubt its pilot has been blown to bits.

As the Augenstern commandeered by Jenny couldn't proceed any further (the rest of the subway tunnel had caved in), Jenny had to get out of it. "Well, at least it helped us shoot our way through this tunnel."

It is then that the Mercenaries, Marco and Fio noted that the firefight that was occurring at his station earlier had been taken up to the surface. The station was already littered with corpses of Guerillas and Special Force Troopers when they got here.

"Our guys might need our help." Marco told everyone as he picks up a **Heavy Machine Gun** that was left at the scene. "We need to go to the surface."

"Yeah, let's go!" Fio agrees.

...

Location: [?]; Lima, Peru.

When the Mercenaries along with Marco and Fio climbed up the stairways and out of the subway station, they found even more dead Guerillas and Special Force Troopers littered all over the scene.

They also found Nadia and Trevor trapped under a stack of rebar. From the looks of things, the duo were only trapped for a few minutes.

"Hey, guys..." Trevor called out. "We need some help here."

"One of those Guerillas pulled off a case of Dead Man's Trigger with a bazooka, and the rocket caused these rebar to fall on us." Nadia explains the situation and how it happened.

Marco stepped forward. "Alright, sit tight. We'll get you out of there."

However, before anyone can do anything about it, a sinister yet familiar voice assaulted their ears.

_"AHAHAHAHAHA!"_

"Who is that?" Fio wondered.

"Sounds similar to Allen's signature laugh..." Marco noted. "But the voice is quite different. It almost sounded... mechanical..."

The Mercenaries quickly recognized the voice.

"This voice belonged to the Ptolemaic's rip-off of the Devil's Sergeant." Jason explains to the Regular Commandos. "They call him Allen Overlord."

Then without any warning, several explosions from behind a wrecked bus caused it to fall right on top of Marco and Fio. Good thing the bus didn't fall all the way down, as it only trapped the duo.

"Great, now we're also trapped..." Marco complained about the situation he and Fio now found themselves in.

Knowing that Allen Overlord is responsible for the bus falling down, the Mercenaries looked around for any signs of the Devil's Sergeant's rip-off.

And there he is, standing on a platform that is hovering in the air seemingly via anti-gravity. And Colonel Gyllendal is with him too, this time in person instead of as a hologram.

"Gyllendal!" Jason exclaimed loudly. "We've been wondering where you've gone to! Didn't see you anywhere in Santa Cruz!"

Gyllendal remained calm as he replies, "Morden was not fit to be my superior, so I abandoned him shortly after I introduced Allen Overlord to you..."

Flynn stood up to give the colonel his opinion. "Damn, you sided with a demon-worshipping cult because you looked down on your original boss..."

Ash turns toward Flynn. "If that's the case, do we even need to listen to his speech? I say..."

Without finishing his sentence, the grey-clad Red Eagle whipped out his handgun and fired a single shot at Gyllendal.

The shot hits Gyllendal right in his chest, sending him tumbling off the hovering platform and falling on the ground with a thud.

Gyllendal was still alive, but with the injury he has sustained, it won't be longer than a minute. The colonel struggles to stand up, but couldn't. He knew death is inevitable for him.

"Allen Overlord..." Gyllendal issued an order with his dying breath. "Kill them..." And with that, he literally ran out of breath and died.

Acknowledging the colonel's final order, Allen Overlord jumped off the hovering platform and landed on his feet.

_"I'll send you home to mommy!"_ Allen Overlord bellowed. _"And I'll make sure nothing can glue you back together!"_

**BOSS BATTLE: _Allen Overlord_.**

"Gee, thanks, Ash..." Jason berated Ash with sarcasm. "You and your _Evil Dead_-inspired mindset..."

Allen Overlord begins his assault by tossing several grenades all over the field in one go.

The Mercenaries maneuvered themselves around the grenades before returning fire.

Allen Overlord doesn't even flinch upon being hit by those shots.

_"Fly, boy!"_ Allen Overlord responds by spraying machine gun fire all over the place.

Avoiding this bullet spray isn't easy due to how tight the shots are packed, so the Mercenaries took cover behind various rubble instead.

Mina quickly jumped out of cover and threw a Grenade at Allen Overlord before jumping back into cover to avoid another bullet spray.

The Grenade exploded, spawning a cloud of dust that enveloped Allen Overlord. Amazingly, the Devil Sergeant rip-off is barely even hurt, although he does get temporarily stunned.

"Is this guy even human?!" Jenny lampshaded as she notes the improbability of Allen Overlord's resilience.

Leon took this chance to run up close to Allen Overlord and empties as many **Shotgun** shells as he could into the Devil Sergeant rip-off.

The **Shotgun** shells blasted right through Allen Overlord's armor, only to reveal _another_ layer of armor underneath.

_"You're mincemeat!"_ Allen Overlord nonchalantly punch Leon in the guts before the Chinese-American Marine even have time to be surprised, sending him tumbling across the ground.

"Ouch..." Flynn flinched as he thought about that gut punch. "But he'll be fine."

Thankfully, being a Marine meant that Leon can shrug off the gut punch just fine (The Marines are known to have almost superhuman endurance), as he picks himself up from the ground and empties another **Shotgun** shell into Allen Overlord before jumping back behind cover.

"Multiple layers of armor..." Leon relays his findings to the others. "To break through that, we need to focus our firepower on one spot."

Allen Overlord tosses another bunch of grenades in one go, forcing the Mercenaries to get out of cover to avoid being blown up. He follows up with a hammy laugh.

"I had enough of that scenery-chewing laugh, so leave this bastard to me!" Jason told the others, before he made a mad dash toward Allen Overlord, wading through machine gun fire with some effort.

Upon getting close enough to the Devil Sergeant rip-off, Jason unleashed his signature Vulcan Chop on the exact same spot where Leon had emptied **Shotgun** shells into. The Red Eagle leader kept on delivering his attacks rapidly to prevent Allen Overlord from being able to counterattack.

Half a minute of Vulcan Chop later, a hole was created on Allen Overlord's armor as it reaches its durability limit.

"Now's the chance, everyone!" Jason called out to the others as he took a step back from Allen Overlord.

With Allen Overlord's armor compromised, the Mercenaries focused their shots at the Devil Sergeant rip-off's now vulnerable body, emptying bullets after bullets (and one **Shotgun** shell after another) into him.

After having several hundred bullets pumped into him, Allen Overlord could not overcome the massive pain and eventually collapses onto the ground, but not before bellowing _"I underestimated you Red Eagles and Marines. Turns out you people stopped taking any chances after everything you've went through. Well done! I will... see you... in hell..."_

_**Allen Overlord**_** defeated.**

Remembering how the real Allen always seemed to come back at a later time, the Mercenaries approached the defeated Allen Overlord and continued to hammer on him with their melee attacks. They only stopped after a minute of double-tapping.

"Man, this must be the most extreme Mozambique Drill, period..." Jason lampshaded as he steps away from the nearly mangled corpse.

Mina used her Katana to stab the dead Allen Overlord once before post-mortem-taunting him. "Baka!"

Flynn poked the corpse several times to make sure Allen Overlord is really dead. "This guy ate more lead that I ever had before going down. Even I am surprised..."

At about the same time, Marco used his **Heavy Machine Gun** to shoot his way out of the bus, with Fio right behind him.

"Wow, I'm amazed..." Marco told the Mercenaries. "So amazed I got no words to describe it."

Meanwhile...

"Hey, guys. Aren't you forgetting something?" Trevor called out to everyone, as he and Nadia are still stuck under the stack of rebar.

Jason approaches the stack of rebar and wrecks it with a lighter version of his Vulcan Chop. "I still remember you."

Nadia came out of the trap first. "You guys go ahead and meet up with Eri and Tarma. We'll be right behind."

"Understood." Marco acknowledges. "Now, everyone, our mission isn't over yet. So let's get going..."

**TO BE CONTINUED...**

* * *

**Afterwords**

This final mission is so long I have to split it into two chapters. If you're wondering how long it is, I've intended for it to have _three_ bosses, with the third battle being as long as the Huge Shiee fight. I guess it shouldn't come as a surprise at this point that the Ptolemaic Boss will be the final boss...

Speaking of the Ptolemaic Boss, he's apparently going to _actually appear_ in a later Extra Ops in _Metal Slug Attack_! Woo, about time, SNK!

Sorry about the Allen Overlord boss fight being so short. I delayed this chapter for too long and had to submit it ASAP...

Boss Buff list:

More like a Boss Comparison list, because Allen Overlord is just a different version of Allen O'Neil...

Shout-out index:

"...I make sure I have the license to kill..." - "Not to break the traffic laws!" ~Q, _James Bond_ series.

_"And I'll make sure nothing can glue you back together in hell!"_ \- The Demoman from _Team Fortress 2_ called, he wants his quote back.

"You and your _Evil Dead_-inspired mindset..." - Interestingly, MadSoldiersProduction _did_ use _Evil Dead_ as inspiration for Ash Kingslayer...

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


	15. Chapter 14: Calling Of Doomsday part 2

**Forewords**

Its been a long time since I posted the previous chapter of _Metal Slug: Mercenaries_, so I'm going to make my _MSA_ rant quick. Mind you, there's a ton of things to cover...

Mummy event - Mind you, Scotia Amundsen is an entirely original character made specifically for this event. You're not going to find her in any _Metal Slug_ lores other than that she's the daughter of that archaeologist you find in _Metal Slug 2_/_X_ Mission 2. The Cat Mummy and Warrior Mummy are also original characters, and so is the Pharaoh's Arc, the big bad of this event with his _ridiculous_ Stun chance.

Sol Dae Rokker - _MSA_'s version of Sol Dae Rokker has those aimed red needles as its Special Attack instead of those randomized yellow ones. However, Hyunwoo Choi of the _Metal Slug Defense Guide_ blog called it a crappy boss unit, and even though I failed to obtain it, I can see why: I _barely_ even see that thing turning up in POW Rescue, Battle, Team Battle and Online Battle, and the one time I did run into someone using it, I can see why Hyun called it a crappy unit (it attacks _really_ slowly, which is very bad in a meta dominated by Stunning and Force-Knockback units). The only good thing in this event is the Japonese (sic) Assault Force, which can be deadly if you pair it at 4-stars with 4-star Mummy and 4-star Dog Mummy.

Ptolemaic Attack - Wow, turns out the guy everyone's been referring to as Ptolemaic Boss for a long time is actually called Ptolemaios by SNK. Unfortunately, he's just as crappy as Sol Dae Rokker due to his crappy damage output. Oh, and did I mention that the whole event is a huge shout-out to _Star Wars_, with Red Goblin - yet another original character, being the resident Luke Skywalker wannabe?

Pirate Attack - Big Shiee is back! And that's pretty much the only thing I have to say for this event, aside from the fact that the Pirates have ridiculous damage output for cheap infantry units...

Golden Soldier - Really? Aeshi Nero? Literally nobody in the _Metal Slug_ community is expecting the boss of _MS2_/_X_ Mission 2 to be playable. What's next? Tani-Oh? And we also have a new original character in the form of Iron Man... err, El Dorado.

Black Future - Kraken came a bit too late for _MSA_, because by this point, it will be easily wrecked by the combination of Leona, Ralf, Clark, Scotia Amundsen, Red Goblin, El Dorado and some other cheap units. For those of you who worked hard to earn it, too bad you've just got yourself another overhyped unit. And what's up with that Professor guy, anyway?

Code: Assault - At Level 40, I was able to breeze through Normal mode very easily, as well as Hard mode. But HELL mode? I'll get back to that later. The original character for this event is a Ptolemaic chick called Dragunov, and she's quite the powerful chick, I might say. Now back to HELL mode: "Eff! You! See! Kay! SNK Pay-more!"

And that's it. Looks like the next event (The King Of Weapons) is going to be focusing on Kyo Kusanagi and Iori Yagami of _The King Of Fighters_ fame duking it out... in Slug Armors. And I though there will be no KOF in _MSA_...

* * *

**Chapter 15: Calling of Doomsday part 2**

Time: 1800 Hours; 31st of December, 2040.

Location: [?]; Lima, Peru.

The Mercenaries (and the Regular Commandos they've just met up with) still have a long distance between themselves and the Ptolemaic Army's stone tower, and whatever occult ritual happening up there is already visible from here as evident of ominous thunderclouds gathering up there.

"Deja Vu..." Flynn makes an offhand comment on the ominousness.

"Did the Ptolemaic really summon a demon last time they were around?" Ash asked the others.

"Regular Command says so..." Jenny hangs a figurative lamp on the subject. "But whatever they're doing up there, we should destroy them to put an end to their world conquest."

As the Mercenaries and Regular Commandos make their way toward the stone tower, something seemed to catch Marco's eye.

"Is it me, or has the tower _actually_ started to move toward us?" He said.

Fio pokes Marco on the back of his head. "No way, Marco! That tower has no legs..." She said.

The Italian SPARROWS sergeant is then interrupted by what felt like tremors... that increased in strength between regular intervals.

It is then that everyone noticed that the stone tower is _indeed_ moving toward their direction.

"Uh... Should I say something about this, guys?" Trevor asked the others, with the fear in his voice very obvious.

What appears to be one of multiple giant feet of the stone tower smashing through an already half-destroyed skyscraper pretty much gave the group the answer they need. That, along with Eri and Tarma already running away from the stone tower.

"Run, you morons!" Eri shouted at everyone as she ran past them without slowing down. "Unless you want to become pancakes!"

A fuel tanker erupted in a huge fireball when a giant foot of the stone tower stepped on it.

**BOSS BATTLE: _Stone Turtle_.**

"Yeah, we should run..." Marco throws in a comment while dropping cold sweat. "This isn't David Versus Goliath, this is Bambi Versus Godzilla..."

As it turns out, the base of the stone tower is in itself an enormous turtle-shaped robot with four equal-in-scale huge legs.

Without saying another word, everyone started running away from the Stone Turtle.

...

"Oh, shit! Oh shit! Oh shit, shit, SHIT!"

Jason shouted the same profanity consecutively while running as fast as his legs could carry him. Having to dodge attacks that came from surviving Ptolemaic troops at the same time made the situation a whole lot harder.

"Why do all of our missions feel like they're stages in some kind of side-scrolling shooter?!" Marco said, while gunning down any Ptolemaic Guerillas along the way.

"To me, they're more like a fan fiction written in the middle of time constrains!" Ash added in.

A Claw Unit suddenly jumped out from behind a pile of debris and lunged at the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries. Flynn intercepts the Claw Unit and delivers a Berserk Punch straight to its faceplate. The Claw Unit didn't get blown apart, but the Berserk Punch did launch it a long distance away.

"Run faster! That thing's gaining on us!" Tarma shouted at everyone.

Unfortunately, it wasn't a very long distance before the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries found themselves running into a collapsed skyscraper that prevented them from going any further.

"Oh, damn..." Jenny cursed. "This is what I was afraid of."

Everyone turned to face the Stone Turtle, and swallowed hard at the revelation.

"Tasukete..." Mina uttered in Japanese.

"We don't have any choice, do we?" Trevor asked everyone.

"Not any sane ones, at least..." Marco said...

...Before raising and firing his handgun at the Stone Turtle.

"Even if we have to die here, we won't die without a fight!" Fio adds in before she too joins in on shooting the Stone Turtle.

"Die trying... I prefer that over surrendering." Jason said.

Left with no alternate options, the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries all raised their handguns and fired at the Stone Turtle.

The Stone Turtle shrugged off everything the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries could throw at it, as it continues advancing toward them. Detecting attempts to attack it, the Stone Turtle jettisoned some tiles from its left and right sides, from which missile launchers are revealed.

"Careful! I think it is trying to shoot back!" Leon warned everyone.

The Stone Turtle starts firing missiles in retaliation to the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries shooting it.

The missiles are easy to shoot down thanks to them having a large profile. Unfortunately, they also came in endless streams.

"How much ammo does this thing have, anyway?" Ash wonders out loud, while keeping his attention on the Stone Turtle and its missile barrage.

"Who cares at this point?" Flynn cuts in. "This big freaking turtle is trying to kill us, like its some kind of monstrosity right out of the _Doom_ video games..."

Saying that made the American Marine remember something.

"Wait a minute..." He slapped himself on his forehead for having just remember it. "I have _the_ BFG 9000!"

With that said, Flynn puts his handgun away, and whipped out the aforementioned oversized weapon (which still bugged the others as to how he carries it in his inventory) and points it at the Stone Turtle.

"Stand back, everyone!" The American Marine yelled at the others. "Because this is going to get nasty...for this Godzilla-sized bastard here!"

The warning given, everyone else ceased firing and crouched down as the BFG 9000 begins charging up for a full-power blast.

"Say hello to my little friend!" Flynn figuratively chews up the scenery before unleashing the full power of the BFG on the Stone Turtle.

The full-powered blast atomized the very air in its way, with the Stone Turtle's missiles disintegrating before their detonators can set off the explosive fillings.

However, the Stone Turtle is completely unscathed, despite taking the blast directly to what appeared to be its head.

"You have _got_ to be kidding!" At this point, even Flynn was surprised by the outcome.

The Stone Turtle is now so close, every step it takes felt like a magnitude 3 earthquake to the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries.

"We are so dead..." Nadia, full of fear at this point, pointed out.

The Regular Commandos and Mercenaries watched helplessly as the Stone Turtle strides closer and closer to them. Its missile launchers can no longer function due to being obstructed by the skyscrapers at the sides.

But then, the Stone Turtle came to a halt. It stopped just half a kilometer short of the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries.

"Huh?" Everyone are confused as to why the Stone Turtle just stopped moving.

What appears to be a trapdoor on the Stone Turtle's belly opened, from which a pillar of light beamed directly downwards from it.

"What is it doing?" Jenny is confused about the scene.

It is then that everyone noticed something strange.

"Do you guys feel something weird?" Ash asked everyone.

What is happening quickly became evident when the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries noticed that, despite standing completely still, they appear to be slowly sliding toward the beam, slowly speeding up with every passing second.

"ITS TRYING TO PULL US IN!" Eri exclaimed loudly. "Everyone, hold on to something!"

Everyone reached for the closest lamppost or protruding rebar from the debris pile that they could reach, as the pull of the beam has become strong enough to completely overcome the Earth's gravity. The Regular Commandos and Mercenaries tightened their grip on whatever they are holding on to, hanging for their dear life as the Stone Turtle tries to suck them in with its beam.

Everyone are able to resist the pull of the Stone Turtle's beam. But the lamppost that Eri is holding on to suddenly gives way, causing the Japanese SPARROW sergeant to lose her grip.

"Eri!" Tarma cried out.

Eri managed to grab on to another lamppost before being pulled any closer to the Stone Turtle. Unfortunately, this particular lamppost happened to be recently polished, making it smooth enough that getting a grip on it is very difficult.

It wasn't very long before Eri loses her grip on the smooth lamppost and gets pulled toward the Stone Turtle's beam. Eri let out a scream before she came in direct contact with the beam and get sucked up into the Stone Turtle's belly.

"ERI!" Tarma cried out in despair as he helplessly watches Eri being taken by the Stone Turtle.

The other Regular Commandos and Mercenaries have noticed that the debris pile is about to give way too.

"Mina, release one of your mines!" Ash called out to Mina. "Or else we'll get sucked in too!"

Mina could not answer verbally, but she could hear Ash's calling out to her. Trying her best to maintain her grip on a rebar with just one hand, the Japanese Red Eagle mercenary reaches for her waist pouch and pulls out one Anti-Tank Mine, which she manages to arm before releasing it, letting the pull of the Stone Turtle's beam carry it the rest of the way.

The Anti-Tank Mine went off in a big explosion when it reaches the Stone Turtle's belly. The explosion did not do any physical damage to the massive monstrosity, but still did enough to short out the pulling beam.

**_Stone Turtle_**** defeated...?**

As the pulling beam died out, the Regular Commandos and Mercenaries could feel natural gravity taking over again. Everyone released their grip on whatever they held on to, and assess the current situation.

"It was all a trap! A gigantic one made specifically for us!" Marco exclaims.

"The Ptolemaic Army probably used the Rebel Army and Amadeus Syndicate as pawns, scheming up all those attacks and elaborate plans like hollowing out Mount Everest...!" Tarma continues the analysis.

"...And reactivating the Chrono Gate to bring in the Future Rebels!" Trevor keeps the analysis running.

And then all of the Regular Commandos finishes in unison, "Because they know Regular Command will send us in to deal with them!"

"So that they can find out how we do things, and prepare the right trap to use against us when we come here!" Fio added.

"The only spanner in the works is that Regular Command sent in the Red Eagles instead!" Nadia ends it all off.

The Red Eagles and Marines are amazed by what they heard.

"Seriously, the Ptolemaic Army did all those impossible stuff... _Just_ to finish some personal business with Marco and company?!"

The Regular Commandos and Mercenaries are then interrupted by something smashing right through the debris pile from underneath.

It was the Ikari Warriors, with Ralf in the lead. Ralf may not be the brightest of the Regular Commandos, but he is still smart enough to notice that something has happened before he and his two partners got here.

"Sorry we took so long. Something happened before we got here?" Ralf asked everyone present.

Tarma loses it emotionally and runs up close to Ralf, grabbing him by the collar and shaking him.

"THEY TOOK ERI! THAT'S WHAT HAPPENED!"

**To be continued...**

* * *

**Afterwords**

Well, guys. I have to cut this Mission into three parts instead of two due to time constrains. College life has it pretty hard on my schedule.

Stone Turtle isn't really a boss fight in this context. That's why I wrote "_**Stone Turtle**_** defeated...?**" with a question mark instead of a full stop.

Marco, Ash... Please don't lean on the Fourth Wall, its pretty costly to reapply the paint jobs every time something manages to scrape some of it off.

And now, let's get back to my _MSA_ rant...

The King Of Weapons - Nope, I was wrong. Kyo and Iori did not appear in the Event in any way. The Event itself actually isn't connected to both Code: Assault and Alice In MSA. Those KOF Slug Armors actually sucked... At least we get to use Crank Keys again (I got the goddamn Everlasting Summer Eri instead of Scotia Amundsen or Red Goblin).

Alice In MSA - Wow, what a plot twist. The Alice we see on the Event poster is actually the projection of an Artificial Intelligence, and that "she" is actually a cyan-hued SV-001 going by the name MS-ALICE. To be honest with you guys, Crablops just isn't worth all the troubles you will be going through. Despite its awesome damage, it attacks _way too slowly_. The only thing about this Extra Ops I find interesting is that it still has a subtle reference to _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_ in the sprite of its Event Points. Otherwise... CRABS! CRABS EVERYWHERE!

And I guess the next Extra Ops I'll be ranting about is Zombie Parade, which could be bringing Big John to _MSA_. Let's just hope Big John is worth the weight... uh, wait.

Shout-out index:

"Oh, shit! Oh, shit! Oh, shit, shit, SHIT!" - This particular form of swearing is first heard in Michael Bay's _Transformer_s film.

"..._Doom_..." - If you don't get this reference, let me introduce you to Flynn's Berserk Punch.

That is all. _"Dismissed!"_


End file.
